{"id":62709,"date":"2021-09-27T14:26:08","date_gmt":"2021-09-27T18:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/?p=62709"},"modified":"2021-09-28T14:52:29","modified_gmt":"2021-09-28T18:52:29","slug":"ywca-grows-rooftop-garden-for-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/ywca-grows-rooftop-garden-for-good\/","title":{"rendered":"YWCA grows rooftop garden for good"},"content":{"rendered":"

If the thousands of people who walk downtown along Hornby Street were to just look up, they would find a green garden oasis that stands out among all the glass, concrete, and stone.<\/p>\n

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The YWCA\u2019s 18,000-square-foot rooftop garden is not only a an environmental and biodiversity success - it sets out to feed as many people in need as possible with its rich, organic food.<\/p>\n

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This year, the garden yielded a record 1,600 pounds of fruits, vegetable, and herbs. And food hampers, meal kits, and lunches go straight from the rooftop soil to the downtown east side.<\/p>\n

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\"YWCA

The YWCA's garden grows a large varieties of fruits, vegetable and herbs - Photo Jordan Kawchuk<\/p><\/div>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019ve served over 39,000 plates of food last year,\u201d says Sandy Reimer, Director of the YWCA Health and Fitness Centre downtown. \u201cIt\u2019s for people in need of good nutritious food, and it doesn\u2019t get better than this.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Kim Enns, the YWCA\u2019s Rooftop Garden coordinator uses her green thumb to oversee a bounty of organic food, from tomatoes and potatoes to kale and kiwis.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAs a food grower, it\u2019s deeply satisfying to be creating enough food for a meal program versus just creating food to sell,\" says Enns.<\/p>\n

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Surrounded by business towers looking down on the green garden, Enns and her volunteers work daily to supply food for the YWCA\u2019s Crabtree Corner, a community resource centre for women and families, located in the downtown east side.<\/p>\n

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And with the rewards of giving back to society, the rooftop is also an urban gardener\u2019s dream.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a very cool job, I pinch myself on a daily basis,: says Enns. \u201cOne of my favourite things to do is to peek over the edge of the fifth floor, and you\u2019re immediately transported into downtown - there\u2019s cars whizzing by, people walking, bikes riding by.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cAnd then you peek back up to the rooftop, turn around, and it\u2019s just this green oasis again\u201d.<\/p>\n

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\"YWCA

The garden is surrounded by offices - Photo Jordan Kawchuk<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If the thousands of people who walk downtown along Hornby Street were to just look up, they would find a green garden oasis that stands out among all the glass, concrete, and stone. The YWCA\u2019s 18,000-square-foot rooftop garden is not only a an environmental and biodiversity success – it sets out to feed as many…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":62713,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[57],"tags":[678,8969,9733,9731,9732,8576],"radio":[237],"origine":[280,262,231],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62709"},{"taxonomy":"radio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/radio?post=62709"},{"taxonomy":"origine","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/origine?post=62709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}