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Swansea Community Farm Director Phil Budd showing FUW president Glyn Roberts around the farm and garden.[/caption]
Farmers’ Union of Wales president Glyn Roberts visited the Swansea Community Farm (SCF) to see the multi-award winning project for himself and drum up support for the Fforestfach site.
Established in 1992, when a group of committed individuals got together with the idea of setting up a city farm in Swansea, the farm is now a major community and educational resource working with over 1,800 programme participants.
Born out of the belief, that the establishment of a small working farm in the city would bring immense pleasure, opportunity and benefit to all sections of the community, the farm is now visited by 10-15,000 members of the public each year.
Despite their success and doubling their income over the last two years to over £60,000, which is 20-25 percent of their total income, the farm now finds itself in financial difficulty due to cuts in funding and launched an urgent funding appeal to ensure that they can continue operating as the only city farm in Wales.
For this they need to raise £20,000 before Christmas and £50,000 by the end of March to ensure operations keep on running.
As a working farm they have always aimed to reconnect people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities with their food, their environment and each other and do this through a range of unique and exciting educational, volunteering, training and play projects.
FUW president Glyn Roberts, who has previously visited a 90-acre Woodlands Farm, on the borders of Greenwich and Bexley, and which is the largest city farm in Europe, is well aware of the benefits of having a city farm accessible to the local community.
“Farming and the countryside is embedded in our Welsh heritage and it is a pleasure to see how the SCF are engaging with the public by offering cookery training in the volunteer built café, through school and college visits and courses and through selling sausages, bacon and meat from pigs reared on the farm.
“It would be a massive step backwards in efforts made to connect urban and rural life if this community farm is forced to close.
“I strongly urge those in power and the people of Swansea to do all they can to support this project so that our children and children’s children can continue to learn about the ways of the countryside, food production and sustainable land management.”
Despite having put considerable cost-cutting measure in place, it will cost £200,000 to £250,000 to run the 3.5 acres farm next year.
“It’s getting harder and harder to raise funds and over the last year the farm has had to use its reserves, which are now critically low, to continue operating as a free community facility,” said Swansea Community Farm Director Phil Budd.
“It’s been three weeks since we announced our latest appeal and we are almost halfway to reaching our £20,000 target. We have had an amazing response from the public but we do need people to keep donating to help us ‘Save our Farm’,” he added.
The farm promotes sustainable development in an environmentally friendly way that supports and respects wildlife and provides its animals with the highest standards of humane care.
It further provides stimulating opportunities for participants to develop skills as they in turn contribute meaningfully to the development of the farm community.
Those wanting to make a donation can do so via https://mydonate.bt.com/donation/donate.html?charity=swanseacommunityfarm or text SCFF12 and the amount you wish to donate (eg SCFF12 £5) to 7007.