5 things I learnt from a community building workshop

September 2012 my husband got a job in Singapore and we both said “Okay let’s move to the island city!” I wrapped up my role as executive producer of Hear and Now in Malaysia and as a freelance communications consultant in KL before joining my hubby in January 2013.

Thrilled at the prospect of a short sabbatical, one I’ve put off the past year, I started asking myself what was I going to do? Continue building a career in communications or pursue a calling? Must I give up one for the other? While wrapping up work and trying to wrap my head around what I would do in Singapore, I stumbled upon a Building a Community Garden course organised by Eats Shoots and Roots . Instinctively, I signed up immediately! It was a three day course on building communities through Permaculture and community gardens with Bruce Molloy founder of Veggie Village Community Gardens Inc.

By the end of the course, I found convergence. A way to converge my passion for composting, growing food and sustainable design with my experience in communications while providing a way to build resilient earth conscious self starter urban communities.

There were many takeaways from Bruce Molloy’s course. I’ve listed the ones I put to use immediately as practical pointers especially while I was working on my first community garden project in Penang a couple months later.

1. Start, and the teachers will come –In other words start first then learn and make it happen! Who’s said this before? Oh yes, this dude . By the way Bruce Molloy did not know anything about growing food when he first started, watch this video to learn from the Veggie Village experience.
2. Observe, listen then design. It is always tempting to jump straight into implementation. But a good dose of observation allows for better visualisation of space and purpose. And a better sense of space and purpose will facilitate a meaningful and effective design process. It is good to have a site visit checklist to help you with this.
3. Starting a community garden will be a hard, long journey, so start with small steps. Project manage, organize, collaborate, mobilse and plan well. Here’s a resource kit that Bruce shared, it really helped me get started: The South Australian Community Garden Resource Kit.
4. Don’t worry if you only start with a handful of people. Growing food in urban areas is not yet a mainstream activity but just going through scenarios for tomorrow’s consumers I have reason to believe that more people will take to growing their own food.
5. Build sociocracies, in other words use tools and methods that will encourage self organisation. This is something I am still working on mastering. Here is a document that has helped me. It provides a better understanding on how to mobilise well functioning self organised groups. Full of tools, methods and processes for us to try.

Since the course I’ve spent all my spare time devouring Permaculture sites, talking to my dad about composting and started growing food and composting on my balcony. Oh and soon after the course, I got lucky, someone gave me an opportunity to work on my first Community Garden Project.

Nova Nelson

Nova Nelson is a permaculture practitioner and consultant with over ten years of experience in Singapore and Malaysia. She is the founder of Cultivate Central, where she integrates permaculture, syntropic agroforestry, and community development to shape regenerative urban food systems. Nova leads the Goodman Community Farm, a demonstrative urban permaculture ecosystem connecting people to soil, food, and environmental stewardship. Certified in Sustainable Food Production and Processing from the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, she consults on regenerative food initiatives and hosts Cultivating Change, a podcast exploring food systems and regenerative farmers, communities and cultures across Southeast Asia.

How did I find myself doing what I do? Read my story here.