Assignment 5: Designing Interventions
Team Complexity: Amrita Khoshoo, Chun Zheng, Cathryn Ploehn, Devika Singh
Initial ideation
Using the spatiotemporal matrix and the 2050 future vision narrative as scaffolding in the brainstorming session, we discussed a range of ideas that could serve as design interventions for the transition pathway. These included-
- incentivizing elderly population to be involved with the regional co-ops
- composting food waste
- propagating permaculture
- developing regional nutrition guides
- building underground greenhouses for microclimate control
- developing mobile grocery vans that can reach underserved neighborhoods
After the initial brainstorming, we followed it up with some secondary research. Eventually, we settled down on three interventions that we believe work harmoniously together to fulfill our vision for 2050 lifestyles. We mapped all our ideas for the intervention on the whiteboard and then through discussion refined them further.
Design interventions
In this post we’ll cover three different design interventions:
- Federal government policy changes and regulation
- Food knowledge becoming central to early education
- Transition to Garden Cities
1. Federal government policy changes and regulation
Background
The solution proposes a change in labor and income tax policies at the federal government level. We propose that the government should offer income tax rebates for employees in exchange for time spent on volunteering in community farms or becoming small-scale farmers themselves. We take inspiration from countries like India that make agricultural income for individual farmer exempt from income taxation. Current capitalistic policies consider time as a commodity and put pressure on people to put in the extra hours. We propose increased regulation on the working time and overtime for private and public sector employees. This can be done by reducing the workweek from the current 40 hours per week and discouraging overtime. This would free up time for people to do volunteer activities. A lot of countries, like Sweden, are seeing the benefits of reduced work hours to improve work-life balance.
How does this project connect to and amplify the others?
In our intervention, the government also provides tax relief to schools that have food-education programs as proposed in the other intervention. The federal government also works with regional and city governments to incentivize the development of Garden Cities.
Which of the present-day fears/concerns or hopes/aspirations does the project address?
These changes would give people encouragement to grow their own food by incentivizing volunteering. Through a culture of cultivation, people are aware of what they’re eating. Secondly, we had observed in the stakeholder mapping earlier, the vulnerable population groups desire the support of the government. Through these policy level changes, the government empowers the citizens to control their food source and consumption.
What are the barriers and challenges to implementing the project? What new resources, skills, technologies, policies or changes in infrastructure will it require?
We believe that the primary barriers will be changing the perception and values perpetrated by capitalism at scale. Regulation of the work-time will face a push back from the big corporations and for-profit organizations. The big agro-businesses will also show resistance as the de-monopolization of will hurt their interests. It might also face challenges in terms of the availability of the physical infrastructure. This implies that existing cities may or may not have space for developing community gardens.
What under-utilized social resources might be leveraged to aid in implementing the project?
People have a strong need for meaningful leisure time. Giving people the much needed time and incentive to pursue such activities will give them encouragement to grow their own food. Getting people to engage with their community and be able to grow their own food is an instance of a synergistic satisfier that fulfills multiple human needs.
How will it shift attitudes & beliefs connected to the problem that might lead to new social norms?
A large scale intervention like this will have a huge impact on shifting the culture of convenience and efficiency to a culture of cultivation and caring for the community. This shift will raise awareness about our food sources as the idea of ‘knowing what you eat.’ The time spent working together will help the community to reconnect with the land and local food systems.
In what ways can it positively impact/resolve other complex problems? In what ways will it help restore local and regional social and environmental systems?
We recognize that this intervention may have slightly indirect impact on other wicked problems but we feel that it will be effective in resolving a lot of problems caused by a capitalist mindset of the society. All sections of the society can be engaged in volunteering for community farms and gardens, such as the elderly and even children. More community farms will increase green pockets in urban areas having a positive ecological impact too.
2. Food Knowledge in Early Education
Background
This project proposes to integrate food knowledge into the education system, starting with primary school. Schools will provide education programs around cultivation practices, food health, and access/security. We envision hands-on classes in school or community gardens that might teach students food cultivation skills, food origins, or healthy dietary practices. Experts in the community would be involved. Children might travel on field trips to community green spaces, farms, or production facilities.
The central idea is that food knowledge would be a fundamental part of a child’s education.
How does this project connect to and amplify others?
This project connects with both projects 1 and 3. Schools can be better incentivized to start food programs through government policy or regulation. Regulation can come in the form of tax breaks or grants to schools/cities for integrating such programs.
Students can help cultivate the “garden city” (project 3) as a part of their class curriculum. Schools can become civic centers that help children develop food knowledge, and gardens can provide hands-on learning. Building in time for hands-on work in the community will also help instill and shift current cultural food norms with the next generation. New norms will include ecological diversity, humans as apart of the biome, sustainable practices, and communal responsibility. By instilling positive values from a young age, we can transition away from values that currently drive this wicked problem.
Which of the present-day fears/concerns or hopes/aspirations does the project address?
We hope to address the concern around healthy food diet awareness that currently affects vulnerable populations. By helping children cultivate food knowledge from a young age, they might 1) carry this knowledge with them for life thus changing food norms, 2) share this knowledge with their family/community. This knowledge might include where to access healthy food, how to cultivate healthy food based on the immediate environment, or what a healthy diet looks like/why it’s important.
In permaculture, this project will address the concern of the ecosystem being disrupted and destroyed. Children will learn how to cultivate the local land around them in ecologically mindful ways.
Finally, this addresses the concern of food being viewed as inert matter. This is a current norm that stems from colonialism’s long history commodifying food and displacing food traditions. By promoting food knowledge at the community level, we hope this project will begin rebuilding place-based cultivation practices.
What are the barriers and challenges to implementing the project? What new resources, skills, technologies, policies or changes in infrastructure will it require?
School and city infrastructures will need to shift drastically. This transition might take significant time and money. School policies will need to change to accommodate new food programs that promote hands-on education. To support these programs, schools will need access to land (e.g., community or school gardens) and education resources (permaculture experts). Further, federal policies will need to change to incentivize schools, cities, and citizens to build and support these programs.
What under-utilized social resources might be leveraged to aid in implementing the project?
Elders with gardening skills or with gardening space can serve as food knowledge or cultivation experts. Further, sections of society that might have extra time can help with volunteering efforts for school field trips. Finally, children who are naturally excited could help keep the momentum for these programs going.
How will it shift attitudes & beliefs connected to the problem that might lead to new social norms?
The culture of convenience that currently dominates society will shift to a culture of cultivation. These programs will start building ecological awareness and environmental principles in citizens from a young age. Principles will include honoring ecological diversity, practicing sustainability, respecting the environment, and humans as part of the biome. Additionally, new norms/knowledge around how to garden will be established. An individual’s connection to food will be made stronger, thus shifting the current norm of food as inert matter. Gardening together in the community will foster communal values and shared the responsibility that currently lacks in society. Ultimately, this all hopes to give people a more long term vision of putting the stake of future generations as a priority.
In what ways can it positively impact/resolve other complex problems? In what ways will it help restore local and regional social and environmental systems?
If individuals are learning to live more cohesively and rely more on their local environment, climate change can be positively impacted. A decentralized food system would decrease poor environmental practices of big agricultural corporations. Also, the presence of more green spaces and the maintenance of these spaces with more sustainable practices might shift air pollution; plants naturally purify the air. Alos, by promoting increased attention to and investment in the local environment and ecological diversity, the wicked problem with the pollinators may shift. Additionally, there will be more investment in health/maintaining health through the building of healthy food knowledge early on.
3. Transition to Garden Cities
Background
Garden cities are self-contained communities that prioritize garden spaces through “green belts” that surround the city [1]. Inspired by “The Power of the Neighborhood and the Commons,” such as microcenters in neighborhoods would supply goods from the territory [2]. Cities and neighborhoods would prioritize urban gardens that supply the rest of the foodstuffs (herbs, berries, flowers, nuts) and process cereals and grains from the region into bread, pasta, and flour [2].
How does this project connect to and amplify the others?
The urban gardens provide the means for everyday engagement in agricultural activities by the individual, reinforcing the skills introduced in school educational projects (see project 2). Further, these neighborhood and city urban gardens provide a forum for continuing a connection with the environment fostered from childhood in these educational programs in schools. Schools can serve as civic centers for building food knowledge, with gardens serving as the crux of the learning process. Students themselves can serve as leaders of these gardens as they learn. Further, the widespread presence of gardens encourages individuals to practice gardening (particularly as a way to receive the tax breaks outlined in project 1.
Which of the present-day fears/concerns or hopes/aspirations does the project address?
Through this project, the concern of mental health and unemployment in vulnerable populations would be addressed due to the biophilic effect of green space and the opportunity to engage in labor. Incorporating green space might incite a positive behavioral change. Further, because of the decentralized gardens and community-wide distribution of healthy food, food deserts would be addressed.
What are the barriers and challenges to implementing the project? What new resources, skills, technologies, policies or changes in infrastructure will it require?
Current infrastructures in cities would need to be transitioned over several decades, beginning with repurposing and rehabilitating land in cities towards green spaces. Agricultural resources would be needed in this process, including tools, seeds, etc. to replenish the topsoil. Further, policy-level change (in terms of zoning) to afford the switch in land-use, prioritizing green space, is necessary. Experts with knowledge in rehabilitating urban lands through permaculture methods are also necessary.
What under-utilized social resources might be leveraged to aid in implementing the project?
Elders with garden skills and free time could serve as champions and leaders in the charge for transitioning land and educating new gardeners in the community. Under-utilized land such as empty lots (which are prevalent in Pittsburgh) could be leveraged.
How will it shift attitudes & beliefs connected to the problem that might lead to new social norms?
Engagement with garden spaces both increases appreciation of the earth and creates new social spaces and seasonal, community rituals. A shift from an extractivist view of nature towards a synergistic view of the environment could occur through learning and engaging with a permaculture garden.
In what ways can it positively impact/resolve other complex problems? In what ways will it help restore local and regional social and environmental systems?
Because it seeks to develop decentralized communities of food preparation and distribution, this project addresses the isolation that feeds into the segregation of elders and the lack of belongingness that perpetuates opiate addiction. Re-establishing a connection to the local environment creates a sense of place, meeting the needs of subsistence, participation, and creation. Further, using a permaculture method of urban gardening at the city scale would encourage ecological diversity (addressing the decline of pollinators) and increase the health of the urban spaces. Indeed, more green spaces would improve the local air quality; plants are natural air purifiers.
Transition Pathway
Beliefs and assumptions to challenge
These interventions challenge multiple dominant beliefs in present-day society such as the culture of convenience, perceiving food as inert matter and regarding humans as above or separated from the biome. They also challenge the practices spread by capitalism like competition and commodification of food, popularly known as ‘McDonaldization’.
Which attitudes have changed at the halfway point
At this stage, we believe that through these interventions, small but positive transitions are becoming apparent. Schools with surplus funding have begun garden program initiatives. Government-owned vacant land become sites for local gardening experiments. Healthy food activists are finding a stronger voice in the policy-making processes.
Change in attitudes that led to resolution/improvement of the problem
We see the following as the major shifts in attitude that will help resolve the wicked problem:
- Culture of convenience in order to save time and money — > culture of rituals and relationships with food and the community
- Food as an inert matter to satisfy hunger — > Food as a network of relationships with the land and culture
- McDonaldization of food: affordable, predictable and consistent throughout the year. — > “We eat what the earth gives us.” Respecting diversity, inconsistency, seasonality of food.
- Humans as above or not apart of biome — > Embedded feeling with the environment
2050 Future Snapshot
Many people have turned to grow their own food as a result of the traditional foodways being restored and the reduced skills gap that exists today. Small-scale community farming becomes a viable economic option in addition to being a sustainable food alternative. This is the manifestation of the garden city at the everyday, individual level. Also, this has been largely due to support of the regional food cooperatives that work together to negotiate the food price with farmers bringing local, organic and fair-priced food to the community. Policy and school initiatives created the conditions necessary for a critical mass of citizens to engage with farming and to band together to form these cooperatives.
Hence, individuals are not only growing for themselves but they sell the surplus at the local farmer’s markets. The whole practice has also given people a chance to bond together as a community and community kitchens and potluck dinners have become social rituals.
Farming technologies have also become accessible at an individual level. The availability of models, such as for solar-powered greenhouses, allows the flow of information between people from disparate regions, helping to improve the quality of the produce and reduce ecological damage. Further, the presence of knowledge networks about food helps people connect with others in different corners of the world and learn about their traditional recipes and preparation.
Sources
- https://www.geni.com/projects/The-Garden-City-Movement/15255
- Power of Neighborhood and the Commons, p.m.
