Camden Right to Grow

Article in the Ham & High by Tania Inowlocki on behalf of CEC

The May and June heatwaves killed an estimated 2,877 people in England. In just the latter half of July, firefighters battled more than 200 wildfires in England and Wales. And as I write this, half of the UK is in drought and more than 20 million people are under hosepipe bans.

The land is parched and some riverbeds are cracked, sucked dry by an atmosphere that grows thirstier as the temperatures rise. That’s because hotter air can carry more moisture: with every additional 1°C, the atmosphere can hold 7% more water vapour. 

While the UK witnessed relentless downpours and flooding at the beginning of the year, London and parts of southern England saw just 1% of expected rainfall for July. The National Farmers Union calls such whiplash conditions ‘climate change in action’ and warns that they make it ‘harder, riskier and more costly to produce the nation’s food’.

Food insecurity is also a focus of the UK’s Joint Intelligence Committee; the National Preparedness Commission; senior food industry executives; food system scientists and practitioners; and Defra’s Futures team, whose recently unearthed 2024 critical systems report concludes that our food and water systems are ‘at strategic risk of catastrophic failure’ – potentially by 2030.

All these assessments underscore the need for immediate, significant, sustained cuts to the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving global warming. What they also point to is the urgent need to transform our food system. 

Government intervention is key to this transformation – and to minimising food supply instability and food price inflation. Complicating matters are poor soil health, heavy dependence on food imports, conflict-induced fertilizer and fuel shortages, and the looming super El Niño, which threatens crop yields of staples such as rice, coffee, and citrus. A Defra task force is currently charged with identifying ways to shore up supplies.

Local preparedness is similarly critical. Camden Council already supports food growing and is exploring ways to ensure ‘everyone in Camden has access to nutritious, affordable and sustainable food’ by 2030. The Council would further embed preparedness by enabling the borough resilience forum to prevent and mitigate food shocks and by enacting a right to grow on public land, especially since all Camden allotments are full and the waiting lists are closed (with waiting times around 12 years).

Residents also have a role to play in reducing our vulnerability to food shocks, for example by growing food (especially heat- and drought-tolerant varieties), composting, collecting rainwater, eating more plant-based diets, storing food at home or in community facilities, and joining the Camden Right to Grow group (email us for details).