Overview of Projects in Geneva en

This summer I’ve been visiting Irène, Alois and Naima who I met trough RTF. It was a
chance to discover their project in Geneva..
Marie
Cocagne gardens and Charrotons gardens
Cocagne Gardens were created in 1978 during a meeting between a group of customers
and a market gardener. They decided together to form a legal cooperative entity and wrote
a charter that included rights and duties of the contract. The first goal of the cooperative
was the production of vegetables baskets, distributed each week to families. In exchange,
the families that received the baskets took on the responsibility of supporting each phase
of production and distribution. They committed to the project at least for a year and paid
for the vegetables in advance. This means they accept variation, for instance if the harvest
varies as a result of climate conditions that are not ideal. One of their rights and duties is to
spend 4 half days of work in the garden. Thanks to this, customers have a better idea of
problems and working methods of the gardeners, and doing so strengthens the links
between them and the customer’s trust in an organic agriculture that is not certified. For
the gardeners, receiving a salary facilitates farming in a high-cost agricultural land area
(+/- 50 000 Euro/ha) with good conditions. However, they are not owners of their land and
therefore depend on the good health and functioning of the cooperative.
Today, Cocagne Gardens has 400 cooperators and about 10 employees. It works with the
maximum number of persons that will still allow a maximum number of good human
relations. Yet growing demand made it possible to start a new project in 2007: Charrotons
Gardens. Today there are 140 families and 3 gardeners (one and three quarters of a full
time salary which are divided among several people). The project is on 2 hectares, with a
lease signed for 9 years. A third of the surface is covered by greenhouses and tunnels that
had already been in place since the previous project that farmed the same land
conventionally. They are equipped with facilities such as a cold room, but infrastructure is
not ideal (for example, there is no water tank to recover water from the greenhouse roofs).
The soil had suffered from conventional processing and is only slowly being recovered as
organic soil. The main disadvantage of renting the land is that the lease ends in 2016 and
costly investments in amelioration are not secured. In addition, they recently received bad
news: the land has been redistricted and building permits have been granted. Geneva
suburbs are constantly growing and few if any elected representatives are preoccupied
about the future of farmers when it stands in conflict with urbanization. However, the
cooperative is organizing a political campaign through a referendum which will be
launched this autumn after the government vote. Many organizations (customers,
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producers, environmentalists) as well as parties at both ends of the spectrum (communists,
greens, but also agrarian rightist party) joined the referendum group and will organize a
campaign. If enough signatures can be collected within 40 days, they will be able to
determine the destiny of the 58 hectares threatened by urbanization. Hopes are not very
high, given the powerful real estate lobby. But the essential question of saving agricultural
land is now the subject of public debate.
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The Artichokes
Another farming project was started in the city centre last year. It is a grass root network
from by neighbourhood as well as professional gardeners producing both vegetables and
seedlings. They are 6 young gardeners who were authorized by the city to use the old
nursery that had been producing plants for parks and public places. Now, the garden is
opened each evening, where all the neighbours can come to get vegetables, which they
weigh and pay by themselves, with gardeners to help and answer any questions. Moreover,
the gardeners use a heated greenhouse they produced 105,869 seedlings* for professional
or amateur gardeners. It is a lot of hard work to have each block of soil, insert each seed in
the centre of it, manage the heating, the daily watering and the light! Another greenhouse
has been converted for getting the plants accustomed to UV-rays. The nursery plants are
certified organic, offering a local alternative to multinational seeds and seedling
companies.
Other projects are blooming in Geneva, such as a movement of young people leaving to
the countryside to live as independent farmers, or squatters who have left after waves of
repression in cities or people who leave be closer to nature. If these initiatives are still a
minority, they are nevertheless growing and ideas and energies that come together make
everything worthwhile.
By the way, if you are ever there, ask any of them to demonstrate the “Kata d’la Houe” for
you… it is legendary!