Welcome To Incredible Edible Todmorden

So What is Incredible Edible?

There’s no clever pitch for Incredible Edible Todmorden. Just as with the idea of sustainability – it’s a new way of living and of looking at life. Here are some of the cornerstones of what we do.
Creating opportunities
Finding land, using buildings, micro finance and other tools and resources.
Investment
The route to training in land skills and to local ways of distributing and buying food.
Enabling actions by public bodies
Removal of obstacles to local action – e.g. by taking away legal boundaries, soil testing, covering public liability.
IET Principles
Active engagement of people, around a sense of place and belonging.
Shared objectives that are understandable to everyone.
A strong belief in ourselves.
Intuitively sensing that what we do is urgently needed.
Not constrained by rhetoric or fancy words, not dependent on the permission of others.
There is no one solution but a jigsaw of many parts.
Reward for labour
The creation of jobs. Families harvesting and keeping and sharing the fruits of their labour.
Openness: you tell us
We are an open group. These are our first answers to questions we’re being asked a lot. When we’ve more space and time, maybe we can paint a very big picture. Or you tell us. Email us with your thoughts: iet_hothouse@btinternet.com

We now have a Menu for the Future

The world is on the brink of a historic agreement about the future of the planet, and how to tackle climate change.
We hope leaders everywhere recognize the urgent need for action. But top-down action will not be enough. Merely technological solutions will not be enough. We need to change the way we think and live, and how we value our environment.
We’ve been learning valuable lessons at Incredible Edible Todmorden about local
action. Now we need incredible edible communities everywhere. That’s why we’ve come up with 10 for ’10 – ten practical proposals, every one of which is based on what we know is possible now – what could actually happen in 2010.
So while those at Copenhagen talk about what they may, or may not do from the top down, we can make a real difference working from the bottom up.

10 for 10!!!

1) Build schools for the future that have the living edible world at their heart.

2) Transform health buildings with edible plants and trees as an integral part of the design and workplace.

3) All public bodies to release land for food growing.

4) Plan for food – Support local food production through the planning system with all local plans identifying places for growing.

5) Tick all the boxes – Make growing a performance indicator for ‘wellbeing’ for all Public Services.

6) Insist all new homes to have ready-to-grow spaces.

7) All social landlords to allocate space for growing.

8) Charter for truly local markets – support local food producers and farmers and campaign for the reallocation of subsidies.

9) Make sure public bodies like schools and health authorities have as a priority to procure local food.

10) Invest in food skills for the future. We need incredible degrees and diplomas, cooks and technologists, farmers and fabulous food producers.