Partly fuelled by the increasing demand for locally grown produce, urban farms are enjoying a rise in popularity.

"As a community we have forgotten how important growing food is," said Rose Marie White, a food activist and founder of the City Farming Project in London, Ont. "We thought it was important to foster the art of growing food."

Last year, the project was set up on a half-acre plot on Wharncliffe Road, a major street in the city's south end. The operation also has access to greenhouses and the backyards of about 40 project members.

White said she had come to realize that multinational companies controlled most of the food being grown on traditional farms.

Mark Spowart, Business Edge

City Farming Project member and urban farmer Rose Marie White gets to work in a greenhouse.

She also learned many farmers need to take second or third jobs "off the farm" to be able to support their farming activity. This model didn't seem to make sense.

Hence, the creation of the City Farming Project, which supplies a weekly "good food box" that contains eight to 10 varieties of seasonal vegetables and herbs to members during the growing season. The project also sells produce to local restaurants, and sells vegetables and seedlings at local markets.

While not certified organic, the project follows organic growing methods, and the crops are selected based on taste and nutritional value. This year, the group plans to grow more than 32 varieties of heritage tomatoes.

Last summer, an outbreak of E-coli in organically grown spinach from California caused many to rethink their food-buying decisions. "It doesn't make sense to buy stuff that is picked and then trucked across the country," said White.

Meanwhile in Saskatoon, farmer Wally Satzewich has been putting a new SPIN on agriculture. SPIN is an acronym for Small Plot INtensively grown and is the brainchild of Satzewich and Roxanne Christensen of Philadelphia.

Satzewich started out as a traditional farmer with a farm outside Saskatoon. At the same time, he was farming small plots of land in the city.

He discovered he was limited on what he could grow in the country. Between insects, deer and other wildlife, he was forced to limit his product to low-value-per-acre crops. Back in the city, he was getting a premium price for his radishes and salad mix.

A major difference between urban and traditional farmers is the amount of vertical integration the urban farmer is able to apply to his operation.

"I have much more ability to control price," said Satzewich, who has given up his rural operations to focus on urban growing.

"I look at price as a range of price I might charge, I can target certain type of revenue from certain crops. I am able to interact with consumers, form that bond, make them understand that higher prices are justifiable."

In Philadelphia, urban agriculture became a solution to the woes of the city's water department. The utility had a burgeoning problem in maintaining green spaces. Urban farming was their answer.

In 2001, Christensen met water-department officials and proposed to establish and study an urban-farm project. "We knew that the people who could help were not aware of the quality-of-life benefits (that farming provides), so we needed to focus on the economic benefits of urban agriculture."

The water department agreed to go ahead with a project, which had two goals: 1) To prove that an urban farm could be a viable business, and 2) to show it could be replicated by anyone else.

"Most farming techniques don't tackle how to make money at it," said Christensen. "They tackle how to grow specific crops, how to increase yield. SPIN farming connects farming to specific revenue formulas."

Working a half-acre plot of land does not require the same capital investment a traditional farmer would have to make to farm a 1,000-acre farm.

In the first year of growing food in 2003, the project spent US$7,400 on a walk-in cooler, an irrigation system, a shed and a used rototiller.

It grossed US$26,000 that year. In 2004, it grossed $38,000; in 2005, $52,000; and in 2006, the project grossed $68,000, with expenses coming in at $20,000.

The Philadelphia project supplies three neighbourhood markets, it operates an onsite farm stand and supplies a handful of restaurants and caterers.

When the project was proposed in 2001, vacant land was becoming an issue for the city. Six years later, as city officials look at ways at making the city more livable, they are starting to put a value on nature.

As a result of the study, Philadelphia's water department has become an advocate of urban farming.

Christensen is now looking at ways to affect city land policy, to get agriculture recognized as a legitimate use.

"The people who do urban agriculture don't come from traditional farm families. They are young and hip, this is the profile you (City of Philadelphia) are trying to attract back to the city. They are just in farming, not web design," she said.

(Mark Spowart can be reached at spowart@businessedge.ca)