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BoerenBruxselPaysans

BoerenBruxselPaysans uses public land and resources to provide new local farmers, or those converting their business, with the space required to experiment and innovate. The project is a crucial component of Good Food, the Brussels strategy to provide every Brussels resident with access to local, wholesome and good quality food in a healthy and qualitative urban landscape. Public land on the outskirts of the city literally provides the ‘free space’ for developing entrepreneurship related to local food production.

In between RSC Anderlecht’s training grounds you will find Brussels last small patch of countryside and the largest urban farming project of the Brussels metropolis. BoerenBruxselPaysans is a large-scale experiment that aims to bring about the transition to local food production in the Brussels-Capital Region. Employment and sustainability serve as the initiative’s core values. Behind BoerenBruxselPaysans is a coalition of public bodies and non-profit organisations that provides new farmers with pilot plots for three years, as well as relevant guidance and facilities. There is shared infrastructure for the production, processing and distribution of fruit and vegetables, for both aspiring farmers and budding chefs. This allows them to test their innovative activities in economic and ecological terms in life-like and safe operating conditions. In addition, as soon as the educational process has been completed, the organisation provides active support in finding permanent land, guidance in entrepreneurship, an extensive public programme with neighbourhood celebrations, cycling excursions and demonstrations, the compilation of composting schemes and cultivation plans, and a local farmer’s market and distribution network.
BoerenBruxselPaysans is unique because it harbours the ambition to grow and become the linchpin in a broader, suburban network. With the strategic combination of physical infrastructure, a growing alumni network of young, trained farmers and a facilitating government, the project is developing a set of basic measures to reintroduce farming in the city. The initiative can easily be replicated in the many pockets of open space along the regional border or in other cities in the country.

partners and actors
Terre-en-Vue, Brussels Environment, Municipality of Anderlecht, Le Début des Haricots, Credal, La Maison Verte et Bleue
theme
care, biodiversity, management, mobility, food
innovative aspects
good citizenship, solidarity, cultural change, policy innovation, financing
scale
region, site, municipality


slideshow
View of BoerenBruxselPaysans
BoerenBruxselPaysans provides infrastructure and guidance to farmers in the Brussels periphery to enable them to test and develop their business.

Pole for suburban agriculture
Pole for suburban agriculture
© BoerenBruxselPaysans
Good farming in the cities
articleGood farming in the cities
Tim Soens and Esther Beeckaert use historical references to establish what an urban authority, in its capacity as a landowner, can do for the contemporary farming community.


Good farming in the cities


photo: De Standaard

Neerpede gets swimming pond, urban agriculture and sports infrastructure
en sportinfrastructuur
articleNeerpede gets swimming pond, urban agriculture and sports infrastructure en sportinfrastructuur
BoerenBruxselPaysans provides inspiration for what an urban food landscape could mean for the city in terms of food production, as well as water storage, local employment, recreation, environmental quality, waste management and biodiversity development. 


Neerpede gets swimming pond, urban agriculture and sports infrastructure
en sportinfrastructuur


photo: Bruzz

https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/657812385.jpg?mw=800&q=85
videoFor local, healthy and sustainable food
The support provided is based on the entire chain of healthy, local and sustainable food production, from soil to plate.


For local, healthy and sustainable food

The support provided is based on the entire chain of healthy, local and sustainable food production, from soil to plate.



photo: BoerenBruxselPaysans

fileRe-build the food landscape!
The programme of requirements and the design for the Ketelboerderij, a key element of the BoerenBruxselPaysans project, symbolises a new relationship between agriculture, the landscape and the city, and between the producer and consumer.  

download / view PDF:
Re-build the food landscape!