Interested in growing your own food this year? GIY “Sow a Seed” Week is the perfect opportunity for you to give it a try! Don’t let is pass for another year – 2013 is your year! The good news is that once you sow a seed, you’re a GIYer! GIY “Sow a Seed” Week 2013 is timed to coincide with the start of the growing season and GIY groups around Ireland will be reaching out in their communities to attract new members locally and highlight the movement as a whole throughout the country. GIY HQ will be doing a national publicity campaign. Last year there were over 40 events held during GIY “Sow a Seed” Week nationwide. We are hoping to top that in 2013!
GIY “Sow a Seed” Week – The Big Idea
Our GIY groups around Ireland will be hosting talks, demos, events and generally getting out and about in their communities to promote “Sow a Seed”. For more details check out your local GIY groups page.
Host a “Sow a Seed” event. Either bring the community into your meeting or go out and meet them.
You can theme your monthly meeting during GIY week as “Sow a Seed” talk about seeds/seedling and do a potting demonstration.
You could host a Seed Sowing Demo in a local community garden, public place or in a School.
GIY Week ‘Calls to Action’:
Join the fun and sow a seed! It’s easy, healthy and fun.
- Register for Operation GIY Nation – we will email you simple food growing projects that you can try at home in the coming months.
- Start a GIY seed-sowing circle with some friends so you can help each other along.
- If you’re already a food grower, help us to spread the GIY-Joy – bring seeds or seedlings to school or work, or give them to friends or neighbours.
- GIY Week Events: See GIY EVENTS CALENDAR
- There are GIY group events in Dublin, Cork, Galway, Waterford, Tipperary, Kildare, Laois, Mayo, Wexford, Carlow, Offaly, Kerry and Leitrim. Highlights include:
- Pop-up Seed Sowing demo in the Phoenix Park Visitor Centre with Dublin GIY groups.
- Pop-up garden by GIY Edenderry in Offaly.
- GIY Abbeyleix seed sowing with tiny tots.
- Practical Seed Sowing demos by GIY groups in Tuam, Cabra, Cellbridge, Dingle, West Limerick and Kildare Town.
- GIY Week courses in The Organic Centre and Milkwood Farm.
- Growing with Children event with Paddy Madden at GIY Lucan.
- GIY founder Michael Kelly in Galway.
- Forgotten Skills Event in Carlow for GIY Week and Slow Food International’s Grandmothers’ Day.
GIY Campaigns
In tandem with GIY “Sow a Seed” Week 2013, we are running a number of campaigns aimed at getting more people (particularly little GIYers) growing their own food.
They are:
Innocent GIY Sow & Grow schools campaign
1) innocent GIY Sow & Grow schools campaign – with our friends from innocent we are sending out Sow & Grow kits including seeds, compost, grow cups and lesson plans to 25,000 school children around Ireland. The schools are competing for prizes worth up to €2,500 and a trip to Bloom in June to meet the GIY and innocent team and project patron Donal Skehan.
2) Operation GIY Nation – we want to get parents and kids growing food together. If you have always wanted to grow your own, but are unsure how to get started, GIY Nation is the project for you. We will be holding your hand through six monthly projects that you can do with your kids at home – we will have you growing successfully in no time.
3)The GIY Get Ireland Growing Fund in partnership with AIB’s Add More Green Fund is a brand new community growing initiative, to micro-fund a number of food growing projects around Ireland. The fund is open to applications from community groups, schools and not-for-profit initiatives seeking to develop growing projects. Grants of between €500 and €5,000 are available.
4) Plot Share is a GIY initiative to match people that need a plot to grow on with those that have a plot to spare. We believe that solving the demand for growing space is about thinking creatively and ‘unlocking’ the vast amount of unused land that exists in back gardens, communities, housing estates, churches, industrial estates and schools.
Source: GIY
