Access to Foods Project

This aspect of the Healthy Eating Project aims to improve physical and economic access to healthy foods.
 
On this Page

• Growing Activities in Schools
• Grow Your Own Grub Website
• Grow & Cook Project
• Food Growing & Healthy Eating Resources
• Bangladeshi Growing Project
• Fruit & Veg Delivery Pilot
• Grow Your Own Grub: tasty food from tiny spaces

Growing Activities in Schools

Two workers developed a project called Grow Your Own Grub and successfully ran it with two Portsmouth primary schools. The aim of the project was to assist teachers with running a simple, inexpensive growing project with children to teach them about where food comes from and to encourage them to eat healthy fresh food and experience food growing.

Grow Your Own Grub Website

This project has now been developed into a website available for all schools to use. It can be found at www.growinggrub.co.uk.
 
This website is designed as a resource for teachers who want to run a food-growing project at their school. Teachers do not need any previous experience of growing and won't need a big budget to run the project.

Grow & Cook Project

In conjunction with Landport Community Garden this SRB-funded project worked with a group of local school children to teach them about food growing and the importance of trying new, healthy foods.
 
Throughout the growing season the children planted and cared for their plants. Every week they tried a different healthy snack and worked on activities relating to healthy eating. As the growing season progressed the children were then able to harvest a particular crop each week and learn to cook a healthy meal. A guide to food growing in small spaces such as balconies has been developed from the project for children and their families to use at home.

Food Growing and Healthy Eating Resources

A simple guide to growing cress and tomatoes at home on a windowsill, balcony or garden is available. See the online version at (link to follow).
 
A guide to encourage people to try new types of fruit and vegetables that includes simple storage, preparation and cooking instructions; 'Munch a Bunch of Colours' leaflets are available for Red, Orange/Yellow and Green foods. See the online version at (link to follow).

Bangladeshi Growing Project

As part of the Access project a growing project was piloted especially for Bangladeshi women.
See the mid-term evaluation of the project (PDF document - 550kb).

Fruit & Veg Delivery Pilot

One aim of the Access to Food project was to look at the physical barriers to accessing fruit and vegetables in the deprived areas of Portsmouth. These barriers include a lack of local shops, transport difficulties and access problems with some types of social housing such as a lack of adequate lifts etc. The delivery pilot was designed to gather detailed evidence about how a project that addressed these barriers affected people's ability to eat healthier diets.
 
For twelve weeks a bag of mixed fruit and veg was delivered direct to participant's homes along with a recipe and a chance to ask questions about what to do with any unfamiliar produce etc.
 

Grow Your Own Grub: tasty food from tiny spaces

6 easy to follow leaflets on growing fruit and vegetables in small spaces like balconies, window boxes or window sills, and recipe ideas for when your food is ready to eat.
Download the leaflets (all in one PDF document - 1Mb).