A Genius Among Us

Accolade after accolade have been bestowed upon this past Wednesday's workshop speaker  sponsored by Western Technical  College's Sustainability Institute.   Perhaps you've heard of this Urban Farmer, Will Allen. Mr. Allen, retired pro basketball player, equipped with a marketing degree had worked for Proctor and Gamble in Milwaukee and left that position in '93 for a dream. Son of sharecropping S.C. parents Allen had grown up on a farm in Maryland and knew something about farming. This man had a plan and a vision in believing in GROWING POWER through Revolution, Redemption and Reclamation by utilizing energy, the earth and community. 

We were promised and delivered this story through 1,000+ slides to illustrate what and how GROWING POWER has and is achieving its goals. Most importantly, Allen's work has connected disadvantaged youth from the inner city with the earth.  He knew that all people need to have good food regardless of where we live.  

This all began when Allen daily passed a failing green house business en route to work in the city of Milwaukee. He decided to purchase GROWING POWER where he not only saved the last city's producing farm within city limits but has built and continues his life's work of helping communities to become more sustainable and grow their own healthy food.

At GROWING POWER there are hoop green houses, kitchens, small animal husbandry (chickens, goats, ducks) hands-on training, on-the-ground demonstration, outreach and technical assistance." Workshops are given in their indoor and out door gardens covering horticulture, aquaponics, beekeeping, worm culture, composting, soil reclamation, food distribution and marketing. 

Food produced here can feed 10,000 folks.

Recognizing the impact of climate change Allen's vision also involved taking inner city ugly old vacant lots and turning them into both flower and vegetable gardens so folks could have visually improved spaces and also be able to eat locally grown food. On top of asphalt wood chips layered with good rich soil composted from land waste food, useless spaces are turned into laden producing gardens without the use of chemicals. 

fish egg sac

Project  after project we saw among others- mushroom production, filtration ecosystems, vermiculture, etc... We also heard and saw how their fish industry works as Tilapia were raised by extracting the 3 yard long egg sacs and mixing in by hand the male fish semen to fertilize those eggs. The Chinese may have taken over this industry but the quality and flavor  are certainly not the same. Black Perch, a much larger fish are GROWING POWERS newest endeavor.

One of the awards Allen has received was a 'Genius' grant from the MacArthur Foundation, certainly well earned as Will Allen has put two unusual denominators together; sustainability and social justice. 

Thank you Will Allen for the thousands you have educated and continue to educate about food sustainability... you are making this world a better place.