"Resistance Is Fertile"
by Liam Robichaud
UVic students gathered outside
their campus library late
last month to participate in a
teach-out for sustainable food
production. After listening to a
series of speakers, students and
community members joined
together to plant ten raised
garden beds.
The event was put on by
the Food Not Lawns Collective,
whose goals include challenging
colonialism, corporate
foodways, and bureaucratic
control by reintegrating food
production and autonomous
action into everyday life.
After an hour of planting,
police arrived and attempted
to disperse the crowd, which
had formed a circle around the
students who continued gardening,
preventing arrests. The
event lasted into the evening.
After the crowd left, the
gardens were bulldozed by university
administration. Following
the destruction of the gardens,
the Collective sent out a
press release about a follow-up
event.
From the release:
The university Sustainability
Action Plan states that the
university aims to “become
carbon-neutral by 2010,” and
to “increase accessibility to
healthy and diverse food options,”
but many students
question the hollow rhetoric
of sustainability when placed
in the context of administrative
inaction.
“While they may say they’re
looking for dialogue, they
locked all concerned students
out of the administration
building last Thur., assaulting
one student when she tried to
enter the building,” says student
Chelsea Barker.
Student Lindsay Harris also
comments on the issue, saying
she believes that it is important
to replant the gardens.
“Food security is one of the
most urgent issues concerning
Vancouver Island,” says Harris.
“It is socially irresponsible
for the University to control
enormous tracts of arable land
and use it only to grow inedible
lawns when Vancouver Island
grows only a fraction of its own
food supply, making us almost
wholly reliant on imports and
fossil fuels used for food transportation.”
The group returned to the
lawn Mar. 31, and rebuilt the
gardens. No arrests were made,
but the University has not ruled
out the possibility of vandalism
charges.