VFH Project 1 | 2020 | Introduction by Henk_Lamers

VFH Project | 1

2020

Introduction

Jeanne de Bont Henk Lamers

Index

Introduction

Social sustainability

Essential human needs

Carbon hoofprint

Cultural time calculations

The angle of inclanation

Organopónicos

Data collection

Shake before use

Waste and water

Almere Oosterwold

Introduction

In the year 2018 we registered as project initiators for the Almere Oosterwold project. It’s a green area in the Flevopolder and about forty-three hundred hectares in size. It’s located eleven kilometers to the east of Almere and twenty-one kilometers west of Zeewolde. It is a kind of ‘do-it-yourself’ area. The concept and development was initiated by a partnership of the Gemeente Almere, Het Rijksvastgoedbedrijf and MVRDV Architects from Rotterdam. A number of limits have been set within the project to preserve the rural character of the area. Eighteen percent of the area has been reserved for buildings, eight percent for roads, thirteen percent for public green space, two percent for water and fifty-nine percent urban agriculture. Residents not only determine what their home will look like, but they also determine the construction and management of roads, paths, greenery, water and public space. The residents have to arrange all that in collaboration with their neighbours. The Almere Oosterwold project is unique in the Netherlands. Nowhere else are the blueprints of project development so consciously and [1.1.1] Maak Oosterwold

completely released. [1.1.1]

Almere Oosterwold Phase 1 with our lot in the white circle.

Future community.

Social sustainability

Anonymous In September 2018 we sold our loft in Eindhoven. We had lived there for over fourteen years. It would take at least two years for us to complete the new house and we had to bridge the period with a temporarily place to live. From that moment on we moved to the tallest prefab residential tower in Eindhoven, forty-eight meters above sea level. The building was designed by Cees Dam. Living in such an apartment is completely anonymous. There is hardly any contact with the neighbours. Sometimes you talk to people while waiting for the elevator. But the conversations were always very superficial. We had mostly contact with the caretaker. Worst thing was you couldn’t go outside, there was no balcony. And you couldn’t open large windows either. When you opened multiple small windows, a Siberian wind blew through the apartment. That made such a noise that we had to keep the windows closed. Champagne During this period we came in contact with our future neighbours in Almere Oosterwold. It started off with email messages, but soon the contact changed into a private group on WhatsApp. As future residents, we started to discuss, decide and arrange things together. On October 14, 2018 we made an appointment to see each other at our building lots in Oosterwold. There was champagne and we celebrated the start of our new community! In short, the first contacts went very well. But then we had to divide the large plot of land into single lots. A stream of questions came up. Who goes where? How big is that lot? Where does which lot fit best? Has that place already been claimed? Why do the lots have to be so straight? Can we make the shapes more organically? It seemed impossible to solve this in one afternoon with so many people and so many opinions. You don’t discuss something like that at a table with twelve people plus three children running round. Saved by the timing, some of the kids had to go to bed and other people had to go or walked out of the discussion. We decided to discuss the topic further via social media. WhatsApp Jeanne took the initiative to draw twenty different compositions for people to choose from. People moved from the middle of the land to the bottom and vice versa until everyone was satisfied. Our lot was first in the middle and was relatively small. In size about thousand square meters. Due to the shifting, the size of some lots had to be adjusted. So we moved down from the midfield along the side of the main road and our lot eventually became thirteen hundred and fifty square meters. But part of our land had to be reserved for the roads. As a resident you will be owner of the roads on your land. A side-road was needed to give access to the owners of lots in the middle of the field. In the end we got part of the main road as well as a side-road on our land. All matters we dealt with were: the roads, utility zones and footpaths. So you really depend on your neighbours in this part of the process. And they trusted you to create the best layout possible. All of this got discussed and decided upon via our WhatsApp group. Within a few days it was all done. A community was created immediately. You can forget about your anonymity in Almere Oosterwold.

Designing a new neighbourhood in Photoshop.

Twenty compositions to choose from. Our lot is number 1152.

Social sustainability explained

Sustainable development

Social

Bearable

Equitable

Sustainable Environment

Economic Viable

[1.1.2] Social sustainability

Sustainability The word ‘sustainability’ will be used often in these publications. But what exactly is social sustainability? Producing local food, for example, is an expression of social sustainability. Take an apple tree. If all goes well, the tree will grow apples at some point in time. But sometimes it grows so many apples that you are stuck with an overproduction. The tree produces more than you need. You can share the overproduction with your neighbours. This also applies to the dissemination of knowledge and information. When we know how to design and maintain an urban food forest, we can pass that knowledge on to our neighbours. This leads to neighbourhood involvement. Support for all kinds of initiatives will grow as people have more control over their own existence. This varies from being well-informed to jointly taking matters into your own hands. Social sustainability is the least defined and understood. Social sustainability has had considerably less attention in the public dialogue than economic and environmental sustainability. [1.1.2] Relationships In many cities, ‘social sustainability’ seems to be a bridge too far. Neighbourhoods have a lot of mutual anonymity. And that situation often leads to incomprehension and misunderstandings. Social sustainability increases safety in the neighbourhood by involving the residents. So when we think of social sustainability, we mainly think of relationships between people. How to treat each other in a good way, and in a way that you both benefit from. If the relationship between people is good, society in itself will also be good. Social sustainability therefore starts in our immediate living environment.

Human needs

Maslow’s pyramid Self-fulfilment

Self-actualisation Achieving one's full potential Including creative activities

Psychological

Esteem needs Prestige, feeling of accomplishment

Belongingness and love Intimate relationships, friends

Basic

Safety needs Security and safety

Psysiological needs Food, water, warmth, rest

Essential human needs

[1.2.1] 360 Magazine

Companies We are really lucky to live in a time where most of all, in the Western world, have access to advanced technology. It has never happened before that, within a year after the outbreak of a pandemic, multiple vaccines have been developed and produced. Supported on a global scale by many governments. That is of course very encouraging and the right moment in time to introduce change. But at the same time we see that these governments are not doing enough to promote change. To support only those companies and businesses that are actually functional and fundamental for humanity. [1.2.1] In 2008, we were also faced with a global crisis but the opportunity to do things differently, to support change, was hugely wasted. Crisis Between 2007 and 2013, several international banks ran into large problems because of mortgages that were provided too easily. In combination with high interest rates, people could no longer meet their financial obligations. Houses had to be sold and the residents stood on the street. The banks were not only in trouble because of the high number of interest and mortgage payments they missed out. Another important fact was that mortgages were worth much less since the houses were no longer worth as much as their mortgage. Since these mortgages were traded on a global scale, the value loss had an enormous impact on the banks worldwide. To solve this ‘financial crisis’ large amounts of tax money were spent to reboot the economy. Priority This situation is suspiciously similar to the ‘crisis’ we are in now (2020-2021). The government is buying the debts and financial shortages caused by less income of large industries such as oil, aviation and automotive companies. Sustainable solutions and climate change are apparently no longer a priority. You would be more inclined to think when a company is irrelevant, or cannot be self-supporting, then let the market take its course. Unfortunately it looks like that banks as well as ordinary citizens have not learned much from the previous crisis. It threatens to go in the same direction as in 2008. It’s sad to see that consumers unfortunately are already queuing up to book a cruise or ski holiday for the coming season. The opportunity to real change might be wasted again.

[1.2.2] Mark Hartevelt

Maslow But which things are really essential for a human being? Maslow identified a small number of core human needs and prioritised them in his Pyramid of Maslow. Healthcare innovation consultant Mark Hartevelt says: ‘The pyramid shows a hierarchical ordering of existential needs of the individual as part of the species. These needs are deeply rooted in biological and cultural drives. Since Maslow's publication, many new theories have challenged this pyramid model, and rightly so. Still one could argue most of Maslow's needs are universal. And so it is a nice proof of personal development when someone can shuffle the needlevels of this pyramid to properly serve his own lifeplan and current life stage. Also different global cultures would require a reshuffle in order to serve local values and needs.’ [1.2.2] Renewal A structural change is necessary for a new industrial policy led by the government with a focus on people and their needs. Much more experimentation and innovation is required. But governments are unwieldy authorities. That will cost years of meetings and filing motions before anything changes. We, Jeanne and myself, are not going to wait for that and decided to go in a new direction ourselves.

Based on an ecological and self-sufficient way of living. Although we are aware that we only have a small impact, we are just two people. The political pollster Mark Penn, celebrates the fragmentation of society (the ‘niching of America’) in his book Microtrends, published in 2007. Penn writes of the power of small groups: ‘It takes only 1% of people making a dedicated choice—contrary to the mainstream—to create a movement that can change the world.’

[1.2.3] Bee Wilson [1.2.4] Jesse Klaver

Every little bit helps to improve our climate and maybe we can inspire many other people to go in the same direction. We start with less (or none) airplane traveling and no long car trips. We will eat far less meat and be aware of our carbon footprint. It’s now becoming abundantly clear that the way most of us currently eat is not sustainable. Either for the planet or for human health. [1.2.3] We’re just going to try this and this may be our last chance. Because if you don't try, you know nothing will change. [1.2.4] That is the starting point of our VFH Project.

How people look at climate change

Major threat Percentages

Median

100

Carbon hoofprint

[1.3.1] Pew Research Center

Framework In 2018, the American Pew Research Center conducted a worldwide survey on serious global hazards such as: overpopulation, food supply and environmental disasters. Remarkably, the outcome of that survey was that eight out of ten people see climate change as a major threat. Even in countries with less concern (such as the United States at the time), a large percentage of participants saw climate change as a serious problem. [1.3.1] We also see climate change as a problem and a threat, and we want to do something about it. But to be able to do so, we need a framework. What can we do and what can't we do? And how do we start? Politics Today we live in a consuming culture that largely determines what we eat and where we go shopping. We can deny that, but this is the case. Then climate change comes into play. For example by eating less meat and more vegetables. By using your pellet stove sensibly or, even better, getting rid of it. This allows you to influence climate change. It is of course a kind of mini-contribution in comparison with what you can achieve through politics. Suppose we buy an electric car. That one-off purchase is negligible when you compare it to a political measure. Reducing the maximum speed to hundred kilometers per hour, for example. The profit from CO2 emissions is many times larger than our purchase of that electric car. And if we decide to stop eating steaks, it will make only a little difference. The impact will be much larger if politicians decide that farmers should feed their cows with seaweed. This will reduce methane emissions by about sixty percent. That is a contribution of serious significance. And it is a large-scale solution. But we have no ambition to enter politics. So we are going to do what we can. It's a very small start to a long-term change for ourselves.

[1.3.2] Rebecca Tarbotton

[1.3.3] United Nations

Emissions ‘We must not forget that our role today transcends climate change. Our goal must reach higher and go deeper. The bottom line, if we're honest with ourselves, is that we need to change everything about the way we live on this planet.’ [1.3.2] Food production is responsible for a quarter of the greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. And we mean all greenhouse gases: water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and ozone. These gases in our atmosphere have the ability to absorb heat radiation and gradually release it in all directions. As a result, they contribute to the retention of heat in the atmosphere. We should be happy that those greenhouse gases are there because we also need them. Without greenhouse gases, the average temperature on Earth would be thirty-three degrees lower. To be precise, minus eighteen degrees Celsius instead of the current plus fifteen degrees Celsius. Food choice It turns out that the world’s population has a significant influence on the choice of food. And therefore it is an important factor on greenhouse gas emissions or the carbon footprint. The carbon footprint is defined as the total greenhouse gas emissions caused by an individual, event, organisation or product. This is expressed as the carbon dioxide equivalent. Then of course we immediately ask ourselves how can we change our diet (breakfast, lunch and dinner) to reduce our carbon footprint? We thought that eating only locally sourced food would be a great start. Eating local food is even recommended by the United Nations. [1.3.3]

Greenhous gas emissions

Across the supply chain Kilograms

Meat consumption While locally produced food makes a lot of sense (long-distance transport leads to higher greenhouse gas emissions), it is also a bit misleading advice. It mainly depends on ‘what’ you eat. When you buy a steak from locally living cows, it is better than importing that steak from Argentina. But what helps a lot more is to eat less steaks. Or simply stop eating meat very rigorously. We don’t see a complete stop of eating meat for us yet. We rather think of a meaningful reduction. By the way, you don’t stop or reduce meat consumption overnight. You have to tackle that very gradually. It took us about five years. Since 2015, we have reduced our meat consumption ten to fifteen percent of what it once was. In practice, that means eating meat once a week. Without noticing, we sometimes do not eat meat for a whole week.

Below this black horizontal line start all food products that can cause a truly positive change in greenhouse gas emissions. The CO2 emissions of most vegetable products are ten to fifty times lower than those of most animal products.

[1.3.4] Science Magazine

Greenhouse gasses The data visualization on the left page shows the greenhouse gas emissions of twenty-nine different foods in 2018. From beef (beef cows) at the top to nuts at the bottom. For each product you can see from which phase in the supply chain the emissions originate. This ranges from land use on the left through manufacturing, animal nutrition, processing, transportation, retail and packaging on the right in the bars. ‘Land use’ (green) covers above-ground changes in biomass due to deforestation and underground changes in soil carbon. ‘Farm’ (blue) is about methane emissions from cows, methane from rice, emissions from fertilisers, manure and agricultural machinery. ‘Animal feed’ (magenta) deals with emissions on the farm from the production of crops and the processing into animal feed. ‘Processing’ (yellow) are the emissions of energy consumption when converting raw agricultural products into end products. ‘Transport’ (red) contains the emissions from energy consumption during the transport of food products at home and abroad. ‘Retail’ (black) refers to the emissions of energy consumption in refrigeration and other retail processes. ‘Packaging’ (white) shows emissions from packaging material production, material transport, and end-of-life disposal. Meta-analysis You can see that the total greenhouse gas emissions per kilogram of food products are defined by the coloured horizontal bars. We obtained this data through a meta-analysis of our global food system. This analysis was published in Science Magazine by Joseph Poore and Thomas Nemecek in 2018. [1.3.4] In this study, the authors looked at data from more than thirty-eight thousand commercial farms in one hundred and nineteen countries. As we mentioned earlier, agriculture is responsible for a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions. To record all greenhouse gas emissions from food production, researchers therefore express them in kilograms of ‘CO2 equivalents’. This measurement value takes not only CO2 into account, but all greenhouse gases. Different What is very striking (and at the same time a conclusion) is that there are enormous differences in the greenhouse gas emissions of the different foods. One kilogram of beef, for example, produces sixty kilograms of CO2 equivalents. The CO2 emissions of vegetable products are ten to fifty times lower than those of most animal products. Methane production from cows, land use for grazing and feed means that beef causes very high greenhouse gas emissions. It is also striking that dairy cattle stacks have a lower CO2 footprint than cattle that is used for meat production. Methane One kilogram of lamb or mutton, as well as one kilogram of cheese, cause more than twenty kilograms of CO2 equivalents. Poultry and pork may have less impact, but still higher than most plants. Pigs and poultry are not ruminants and therefore do not produce methane. They have significantly lower emissions than beef or lamb. The flooded rice fields produce methane, which dominates emissions during production. Production emissions for wild fish refer to the fuel used by fishing boats. The methane production of cows means that their milk has a significantly higher greenhouse gas emission than vegetable milk.

Olive and walnut trees store carbon in the tree itself.

Freight transportation You can see that transport only makes a small contribution to emissions. For most food products this is less than ten percent and it is much smaller for the largest greenhouse gas emissions. With beef, the beef cows, this is only zero point five percent. Tree species Not just transport, but all processes in the supply chain after the food has left the farm, processing, retailing and packaging, only account for a very small part of the greenhouse gas emissions. And then something that is also interesting to know. Olive oil and nuts produce a negative change in land use because olive and nut trees store carbon in the tree itself. That is also something to take into account when purchasing tree species for our forest garden in Almere Oosterwold.

CO2 Carbon dioxide (chemical formula CO2) is a colourless gas with a density about fifty-three percent higher than that of dry air. It occurs naturally in Earth's atmosphere. Natural sources include volcanoes, hot springs and geysers, and it is freed from carbonate rocks by dissolution in water and acids. Because carbon dioxide is soluble in water, it occurs naturally in groundwater, rivers and lakes, ice caps, glaciers and seawater. It is present in deposits of petroleum and natural gas.

Greenhouse effect The greenhouse effect naturally keeps the earth warm. Greenhouse gases, especially water vapour and carbon dioxide, trap the sun's heat. Since 1750, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by about forty percent. This increase was caused by the large-scale burning of fossil fuels such as coal, petroleum and natural gas. The amount of methane has more than doubled (one hundred and fifty percent).

Forest garden This is a low-maintenance, sustainable, plant-based food production and agroforestry system based on woodland ecosystems. It is incorporating fruit and nut trees, shrubs, herbs, vines and perennial vegetables which have yields directly useful to humans.

Papyrus Calender. Heqanakht’s papyrus containing reference to the month of Shef-bedet.

Cultural time calculations

The past Early 2020 we started our VFH Project (Vegetables, Fruits and Herbs) and began to collect data per year. But somehow it wasn't right. It did make sense to start from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2020. This idea was based on the calendar. The calendar is a man-made idea that originated partially from nature. The history of the calendar was a matter of human trail and error. That brought us to the question: where does that calendar actually come from? To find out we have to go back a bit in the Wiki history. Domestication To start off, we will roughly go through the history of agriculture. Here is why. Modern man originated in Africa about three-hundred thousand years ago. These people lived as hunters and gatherers. They hunted animals and collected plants to eat. Usually they had no permanent place to stay and travelled in groups of twenty to fifty people. Those groups were constantly looking for areas where enough food could be found. This way of living lasted for about two-hundred and ninetythousand years. At that time, humans first began to ‘improve’ the characteristics of plants and animals. A process arose by which humans would change animals and plants through selection and breeding. The characteristics of plants and animals changed in such a way that they got adapted to live close to and in the service of people. At that time people had a permanent place to stay. So it became essential to know when to sow and harvest. They needed a system that divided the time for them. A kind of system that deals with days, weeks, months and years. A calendar provided that insight. Unfortunately there were many calendar systems in the past. Egyptian calendar The Egyptian calendar is believed to have been first used in –2782. Oddly enough, the Egyptians divided the year into three seasons. Their seasons were based on the tides of the river Nile. The first season started approximately in the middle of July. During that period the Nile overflowed its banks and the fields were provided with fertile silt. The second season started in November and represented winter or a period of growth. The third season started in March and then lasted until midJuly. This was the harvest season. The year was then closed with five separate days reserved for the birthdays of a number of imaginary gods. The problem with the Egyptian calendar was that it counted more than a quarter of a day less per year compared to the solar year. A solar year is the time it takes the earth to orbit the sun once. For example, every four years the seasons were one day behind the solstice. The solstice is the event when the sun reaches its northernmost or southernmost position when viewed from Earth. Ivlivs The Roman calendar, the Julian calendar, is based on the phases of the moon and divides the year into twelve months. The year started with March and ended with February. A week had eight days. The seven-day week was not introduced in Europe until around the year 400. However, because the calendar was based on the lunar cycle, the Roman calendar was ten days behind the solstice each year. They tried to compensate this by regularly entering a thirteenth month. But sometimes the Romans forgot about this. Around –50, the Roman calendar was more than three months behind the solstice. So that didn’t work well. In –46 Julius Caesar decided to put an end to this. He determined that each month, except February, would have thirty or thirty-one days. In addition, there was one leap day every four years. In this way, the Roman calendar from then on coincided exactly with the solstice. In honour of this adaptation, the seventh month, formerly Quintilis, was named after Caesar (July). Emperor Augustus later adjusted the Julian calendar with a few minor details. He also decided to claim a month for himself: August. 23

Gregorian calendar by Johann Sadeler I, 1595.

Gregory Because the solar year actually lasts 365.2422 days and the Julian calendar 365.25 days, the calendar was about 7.8 days behind every thousand years. That is actually not too bad. But the Neapolitan physician Aloisius Lilius corrected the Julian calendar anyway. The leap year system was adjusted. From now onwards each year that was divisible by four but also by a hundred was not a leap year. Unless it could also be divided by four hundred. The average year in the Gregorian calendar therefore lasts 365.2425 days. As a result, the calendar is only 0.3 days behind the sun per thousand years. Pope Gregory XIII introduced this calendar on October 4 in the year 1582. He corrected the deviation as following: after Thursday, October 4, 1582 the next day became Friday, October 15, 1582. This solved the problem of the difference between the calendar year and the solar year. For us the result was to base our VFH project not on a calendar. Vegetables, fruit and herbs don’t care about a calendar. Their life is based on seasons.

Roman farmer's calendar. Each side bears the names of three months of the year. For each month we can see, starting from the top: the number of days, the duration of the day and night expressed in hours.

After we sold our apartment we had to find a temporary home to live in until our new house was ready. In October 2018, we moved to the sixteenth floor of ‘De Admirant tower’. Henk was really curious what would happen when you took pictures from the front window over four seasons. But only at a time when there was really something special to see. The time and day were not relevant. It was important to take every photo from the same point of view. The green frame around the pictures represents Spring. The yellow one represents Summer. The orange frame represents Autumn and the blue frame represents Winter. All 250 photos were taken from October 2018 to October 2019.

All photo‘s can be found at Flickr

The angle of inclanation

North star As we saw in the previous chapter we decided to think in terms of seasons instead of calendar years for our VFH project. We all know that the seasons form an annually recurring three-month period: spring, summer, autumn and winter. They arise from the tilt of the Earth's axis in relation to its orbit around the sun. The tilt angle is 23.45 degrees. The higher the tilt, the greater the difference between summer and winter. Throughout the year, the earth is in the same direction with the earth's axis pointing towards the North star. Administration But... there is something else. We (humans) have two different types of seasons in use. Forget about the football, skating and hurricane season. We have meteorological and astronomical seasons. These are two different interpretations. According to the meteorological method, there are fixed days in the year when a season begins and ends. That’s the easy way. Dates are simply set at the beginning of a month with the same start and end dates. That is administratively easier for the meteorological institutes to be able to archive all data. Approximately We have opted for the difficult way: the astronomical seasons. These seasons are determined by the moment when the sun hits the tropic or equator. This is usually a reasonably accurate time, often around the twenty-first day of a month. But not exactly. Seasons can start and end on the twentieth, twenty-first, twenty-second, or twenty-third day of a month. We will not go into it how this works exactly, but we have roughly used the following dates. By the way we use the astronomical seasons for the Northern Hemisphere. We will start in 2020 with spring: March 21 to June 20. Summer: June 21 to September 20. Autumn: September 21 to December 20. And we end with winter: December 21 to March 20. Banana tree The aim of this project is to see what the influence is on our eating- and purchasing behaviour when we do urban agriculture in Oosterwold. It’s nice to show the difference between living in Eindhoven and Almere Oosterwold. We like to know to what extent we can be self-sufficient. There are some exceptions to this, we are not going to plant banana trees. But a fig tree must be possible. We are already trying to make food-purchases that are only available in the season. So no blueberries from Peru in the winter. We just wait until they come from Poland, Portugal or the Netherlands. We prefer to buy everything organic. But are willing to make exceptions if it is not available. Fruit on the organic market is often too small, too expensive or not edible. So we don’t buy any fruit on the organic market in wintertime.

[1.5.1] Naomi Klein, No Time

[1.5.2] Gezond nu

Pros In her book ‘No time’ Naomi Klein writes: ‘The two hallmarks of this era are the massive export of products over vast distances (steadily emitting CO2 along the way) and the import around the world of an unparalleled wasteful model of production, consumption and agriculture (also based on the wasteful combustion of fossil fuels.’ [1.5.1] Eating what is available in the season has many advantages. If you choose seasonal products, it is less likely that the product comes from a heated greenhouse or from a country far away. In season there is a lot in stock and it is of good quality. Moreover, the price is very attractive. If you have to wait a whole year for a product to be available, then it is also tastier. After all, the products are at their best when they have just been harvested. Gezondnu [1.5.2], lists five reasons for eating according to the seasons. One: you eat more varied. Two: you feel more connected to the season. Three: you save money. Four: you think about the environment. And five: your food is of better quality.

Spring 30

Summer

Autumn

Winter

[1.5.3] Voedingscentrum

We would like to add that you know where your food comes from. And that you live along nature. Because of the wide range of specific vegetables you learn about quality by tasting them. According to the Voedingscentrum, seasonal fruit and vegetables are also less harmful to the environment. [1.5.3]

[1.5.4] Milieucentraal

Cons Eating in season has also drawbacks. You can only eat what is offered. If you have an appetite for strawberries in the winter, you are out of luck. It requires an adjustment in your eating behaviour. But we think: that it was no different fifty years ago. The chance that there were grapes and bananas in the fruit bowl in wintertime was minimal. The current situation, that you can eat whatever you want, every day of the year, has ultimately been a very negative development for planet earth. Another drawback, according to Milieu Centraal, is that the impact on the environment of animal products is usually greater than the impact of fruit and vegetables. But the cultivation, packaging and transport of fruit and vegetables also have an impact on the environment. It all costs energy and raw materials. [1.5.4]

[1.5.5] Veggipedia

[1.5.6] Oirschot Organics

Environmental impact How do we know which products are available in spring, summer, autumn or winter? Fortunately, that is not that difficult. You go to the website veggipedia. [1.5.5] There you will find the correct information about most products. Organic markets sell only what is available in season. But how do we explain the fact that we can buy bananas from the Dominican Republic all year round on the sustainable weekly market? We discovered that firm fruit such as bananas, citrus fruit and grapes always come from far away. But they do come in huge quantities at the same time. As a result, according to the voedingscentrum, the burden on the environment is not too bad. Which is actually pretty vague data if you ask us. Workable The supply of fruits and vegetables in a season is therefore not completely waterproof. There is much more available than is offered in a season. For example, you can buy organic courgettes and aubergines almost all year round. These are grown in the greenhouses of Oirschot Organics. [1.5.6] Are we not allowed to buy them because they are not in the season? How do we handle that? We solve these problems step by step. To begin with, we have created four spreadsheets. One for spring, one for summer, one for autumn and one for winter. In it, we link all the recipes we use to the seasons. So if you have a zucchini recipe you can make this recipe when the zucchini is available in season. That seemed clear to us. But after a thorough discussion, we made an exception. All recipes linked to a season are shown in black. All recipes with products that are available all year round are shown in red. That way you always know whether it is an authentic seasonal recipe or not. You have to decide for yourself how far you would like to go with that.

House and driveway

Urban Agriculture

Scattered green Main road The Oosterwold organisation sets the conditions to spend at least 50% of your land on urban agriculture. We have managed to use 52,02% of the land for this.

Organopónicos

Kitchen routines The 2003 film ‘Kitchen Stories’ (Norwegian: ‘Salmer fra kjøkkenet’) is situated in post-war Sweden. Scientists discovered that the average housewife travels the distance Stockholm, Congo in one year. A good seven-thousand kilometers. That conclusion was interpreted in the film as being very impractical. So the Home Research Institute sent eighteen observers to a rural district in Norway to chart the kitchen routines of single men. Day and night. Afterwards the kitchens would be optimised on the basis of that data. Scientists Director Bent Hamer was amused after reading the post-World War II research books on the efficiency of the Swedish housewife. He considered the idea of researching men. Single women may have been too embarrassing for the scientists (and for the women). The investigators had a telephone connection for twenty-four hours and were seated in strategically placed tennis umpire chairs in eighteen different kitchens. These scientists also applied a number of strict rules to ensure that the research proceeds as optimally as possible. The rules were: build confidence with the subject, collect data unobtrusively, observe without interference and never become friends. Attitude The problem that you face as a scientist is that when you are in a room day and night, with a person as the subject, you immediately influence that person‘s behaviour. It makes no difference whether something like this happens in a laboratory or in someone’s kitchen. So the essential question is: do people change their behaviour when they are observed? In the case of the main characters in ‘Kitchen Stories’, that change is significant.

[1.6.1] The way we eat now

In 2016 a kindly barber told me: ʻI don’t really think none about it, although I have to say that when I see people pick up cigarette butts from the sidewalk I appreciate their caring, and people that care about the earth, I mean, that’s nice, and when I think about the polar bears losing their land, I do feel touched about that, because I care a lot about animals.’ For him, an ecosystem was something to watch on television while he ate takeout pizza. Vollmann, William T. No Immediate Danger. Penguin Publishing Group.

Available In our VFH Project we are not affected by observation. But we adjust our choice of food depending on the availability of vegetables, fruits and herbs. Whether we will succeed in this? We think so. People have adjusted their food habits many times before. After all, tomatoes are not native to Italy, nor tea to Britain. [1.6.1] We also deliberately stick to these three groups: vegetables, fruit and herbs. We are not going to keep livestock, chickens or koi carp. Nor does it look like we will be producing cheese, butter or milk. We really want to compare the vegetables, fruit and herbs that we buy on the markets and supermarkets with the vegetables, fruit and herbs that we are going to grow in Almere Oosterwold. Moderate Why are we doing this? As we saw before food production is responsible for one third of all greenhouse gasses. If we pay more attention to what we eat, what we grow and how efficient we will use it, we can help global warming a little bit to slow down. The second point is that in Almere Oosterwold we have to establish urban agriculture for fifty percent of our land. A requirement that is imposed on the residents. Every resident interprets that requirement more strictly or more loosely, but we want to meet that requirement as good as possible. Your lot must, so to speak, yield something edible for everyday life. Insight With this, ‘the neighbourhood’ gains in value. Because urban agriculture gives a positive impulse to the living environment. It contributes to social cohesion and nature awareness. Plus it promotes the use of healthy food. Urban agriculture is usually a sustainable form of organic agriculture. It concerns unprocessed products. The distances the food travels before it reaches the kitchen is very short, from our garden to our kitchen.

Cuban urban agriculture.

It is true that the small-scale character does ensure a lower harvest than other common forms of agriculture. But on the other hand, we do not need a large crop. Cuba Urban agriculture is not new, by the way. In the Second World War you had the ‘Victory Gardens’. In London parks, Berlin and cities in the United States, people were urged to grow their own vegetables. This was done to complement the shortage of fresh vegetables. An unexpected but surprising example of successful urban agriculture comes from Cuba. After an armed conflict broke out between the rebels led by Fidel Castro and the reigning government of Fulgencio Batista. The United States declared an arms embargo in March 1958. In 1960, the export of sugar from Cuba to the United States was severely restricted. This made the Soviet Union the largest consumer of sugar.

[1.6.2] Cubanismo

Cigars Because of the close relationship between Cuba and the Soviet Union, President John F Kennedy decided to impose a more extensive embargo. Before that embargo was imposed, he imported twelve hundred Cuban cigars for himself. After this, the embargo against Cuba was toned down or strengthened depending on the incumbent US presidents. That made self-sufficiency a necessity for Cuba. [1.6.2] Local Thousands of organopónicos (perfected vegetable gardens) have sprung up in Cuba over the past thirty years. It is a collaboration between the population, universities, research centers and local authorities. This resulted in efficient urban agriculture with its own seed banks and dissemination of the acquired knowledge. Urban agriculture in Cuba covers more than two million hectares of land. And an estimated half a million families contribute to the food production. In Havana, the production meets even the entire need for vegetables.

Data collection

Recipes What exactly does the collection of data with regard to our consumption of vegetables, fruits and herbs entail? What do you have to do for it? Well... we usually start with it on Wednesdays. Then we make a choice from the recipes that we are going to make for the coming week. That week then runs from Thursday to Wednesday the following week. This is how it became a habit during the time of the Covid-19 outbreak. Thursday appears to be the best day for us to go shopping. Spreadsheets Forty years ago, we just ate whatever we liked. Food was not really a priority in our lives back then. You just had to eat. But when you take the seasons into account, it requires a different approach. As we mentioned before, we now have four spreadsheets in which all recipes are listed. These are broken down by spring, summer, autumn and winter. At the time we wrote this, it was the middle of winter. So we choose recipes from the winter spreadsheet. And made our choices for the coming week.

To put that in context: In 1965, the average time spent cooking and cleaning in American homes was 65 minutes. In 1995, it was 31 minutes. To raise man’s efficiency—to reduce man’s toil, that wish came true, thanks to electricity. Vollmann, William T. No Immediate Danger. Penguin Publishing Group

Forty minutes The lists are arranged alphabetically, from asparagus to zucchini. Those spreadsheets with recipes contain references to the seasonal vegetables as a main ingredient. It also contains the name of the recipe. The author and title of the cookbook. The page-number where you can find the recipe. And finally how much time it takes to cook it. When Jamie Oliver says that his ‘Mexican Caesar Salad’ takes forty minutes to make, we assume that the recipe will take us no more than seventy to eighty minutes. After all, he is busy in the kitchen every day and it is his profession. We spend a maximum of one to one and a half hour a day in the kitchen. Shopping list After we made our choices we gather a shopping list. It is broken down by locations where we will buy everything. At the weekly markets or in the supermarkets. Furthermore, the shopping list is also divided according to how the shop or market is set up. What is at the entrance of the shop comes first on the list and the rest follows. We then export the file into a pdf-file and place it on our iPhones ready for shopping. Print quality Buying products on the sustainable weekly market usually goes quite smoothly. The market people know us by now because we are always critical on the receipts. The print quality of the receipts got so bad at one point that you had to scan and edit them in Photoshop to make them readable. When even that no longer worked, it became unworkable for us. So kindly asked the market people if they could do something about the print quality because it takes us a lot of time to make them readable. It turned out that the latest cash register scale printed the worst. There was only one cash register scale that could print legible receipts. So we would be referred to that from then on. Then we wondered... why don’t they install new print units in all cash register scales. An illegible receipt is not really functional if you receive it as a customer. Or maybe all the other customers don‘t think it‘s important. They just want analogous proof that they have bought something on the market. Mental arithmetic We collect all receipts from the market, sustainable weekly market and supermarkets. This is never a problem in supermarkets. But it’s a different story on the weekly market. One day we bought fruit and vegetables at the weekly market from a new friendly seller and asked for the receipt. Her answer: ‘Receipt? Do you want a receipt? I do not have that. I calculate everything in my head.’

The seller was older and experienced and no one seemed to be bothered. So we had to find out what the costs were. The receipts of the week before became very helpful. We often purchases the same items every week. This way we still had the right costs for completing the data sheet. Shiitake Another difficult thing is that you have to check where the products come from. In order to determine the transport data. It is not that easy to find out. For a while we tried to photograph all the crates or boxes in which the products were stored. But that is not a waterproof system. Products are often advertised in boxes or crates that were previously used for other products. So the bananas are in boxes that previously contained tomatoes. Or the shiitake is in a box where the potatoes used to be in. We had to ask the market vendors where products came from. That quickly turned out to be cumbersome for both parties. Another recent development is that all products are placed in the same standard plastic crates. Then you can no longer see where the products come from. Hassle Fortunately, some fruits have stickers you can use to determine the origin. Or the fruit comes in a paper bag stating its origin. But often market traders do not even know where their products come from. They know the country of origin, but the region or village of origin is often unknown. It also happens that a receipt says: ‘1 Item’. Then you will have to weigh the cucumber yourself. In addition, you have to type all that data into a spreadsheet. Boring and serious work but you get used to it after a while. In fact, we would miss it when we stop collecting data. It gives you a nice overview of all your purchases. Another advantage is that after four seasons you can compare this data with the previous or the coming seasons. And that also leads to new and better insights. So much for the administrative hassle or data collection.

Nutritional values Arla

Nutritional values Zaanse Hoeve

Content 1 liter Nutritional value Energy Proteins Carbohydrates of which sugars Salt Fat of which saturated

Per 100ml 149kj (35kcal) 3,3 grams 3,7 grams 3,7 grams 0,11 grams 0,5 grams 0,4 grams

Calcium Vitamin B2 Vitamin B12

120,0 mg * 0,17 mg ** 0,28 μg ***

Content 1 liter Nutritional value Per 100ml RI* Energy 121 kj (29kcal) Protein 3,1 grams Carbohydrates 2,9 grams of which sugars 2,9 grams Salt 0,1 grams Fat 0,5 grams of which saturated 0,3 grams of which unsaturated 0,2 grams Calcium 106,3 mg 13,29% Vitamin B2 / Riboflavin 0,1 mg 10,71% Dietary fiber 0,0 grams

* 15% of the DRI ** 12% of the DRI *** 11% of the DRI DRI = Reference Daily Intake

* Reference intake of an average adult is 8400 kj / 2000 kcal

Shake before use

[1.8.1] Arla

[1.8.2] Weidemelk

Buttermilk During lunchtime, we had a carton of Arla buttermilk on the table. [1.8.1] This buttermilk is organic and completely climate neutral. The package is 98,5 procent recyclable. This of course raises questions like: how much does a liter of Arla organic buttermilk cost? It seemed to be one euro and twenty-nine cents. We compared it with a regular carton of buttermilk, like ‘De Zaanse Hoeve Karnemelk’ which costs seventy-nine cents. A difference of fifty cents and that is a lot for such a product. You might ask yourself why are honest produced products more expensive than products which pollute the environment during its production. It doesn’t make sense. The politicians need to solve this situation. Actually the Arla buttermilk should have been cheapest. Because it is better for nature and people. Meadow milk ‘De Zaanse Hoeve’ is fifty cents cheaper. On the packaging you read: It has a NutriScore A. So that’s a healthy choice. The buttermilk has a wonderfully fresh taste and is made from meadow milk. [1.8.2] Meadow milk comes from farms that leave their cows to graze in the meadow for at least hundred and twenty days a year and at least six hours per day. The packaging bears the FSC logo. Mixed cardboard of responsible origin FSC-C081801. All of this sounds good. We just bought those two cartons of buttermilk. One carton of ‘De Zaanse Hoeve’ and one carton of Arla buttermilk. We wanted to experience the differences between both products. We came to the conclusions that both buttermilk’s taste very much the same. There is hardly any difference in taste or smell. Jeanne thought the Arla was slightly sweeter and has a bit more of a vanilla flavour. And she experienced that ‘De Zaanse Hoeve’ is slightly thinner. That’s all. Investment So why do we pay an extra fifty cents for the Arla buttermilk? There are four good reasons for this. First of all, the buttermilk is climate neutral. This means that Arla compensates all greenhouse gases released in its production chain. Secondly, Arla fully compensates leftover greenhouse gases by financing projects that reduce, prevent or absorb greenhouse gases. They do this by investing in projects aimed at planting new trees and preserving rainforest. Thirdly, only green energy and biogas are used for production. No wood is used for the biogas, but organic household waste. Fourthly, the packaging is fully recyclable, made from unbleached cardboard and reusable plastic. Nutritional values We have graphed the nutritional values of both types of buttermilk. Both products show very few differences. The production process makes the difference in price. You get twenty eight kiloJoule more energy from Arla buttermilk. And it is striking that it contains vitamin B12 / Cyano-Cobalamin. B12 is necessary to prevent cardiovascular disease. Cyano-Cobalamin is added to food such as baby milk powder, breakfast cereals, energy drink, soy milk, vegetarian meat substitutes, chicken, pig and fish breeding food. When you put all these points next to each other, we think it is perfectly justified that we pay an extra fifty eurocents. But this climate neutrality should actually be applied to all foods. Climate neutral as a selling point. Incidentally, Demeter's buttermilk (biodynamic) costs one euro and fifty-nine cents and is therefore the most expensive buttermilk. Invisible Much of the production process is invisible to consumers. In the supermarket, you simply grab a carton of buttermilk from the refrigeration unit. But we don’t know everything that precedes to that action. Take the Arla dairy farmers, for example.

They own the Arla company and supply Arla the milk they produce. The dairy farmers also produce the vast majority of the animal feed on their own farm. This leaves out the transportation of the food and that helps to reduce CO2 emissions. In this way, the dairy farmers optimally monitor the quality of the entire process and can therefore guarantee sustainable and high-quality milk production. Climate check Arla has also started measuring the carbon footprint of their dairy farmers. The farmers use the climate check tool designed by Arla Foods for this. With this tool, dairy farmers can enter all their individual farm data, which calculates their carbon footprint. The farmers receive an extra cent per liter of milk for completing the climate check. Subsequently, it is examined which reduction measures are needed and what the financial feasibility is for the dairy farmers. All these activities deliver completely climate-neutral products.

[1.8.3] Campina

Odour contamination A few months ago, the producer of dairy products, Campina, introduced packaging without a plastic cap. [1.8.3] They presented it as a selling point. Actually it is the same packaging we had at the end of the last century. And that had drawbacks. More than twenty years further there are still disadvantages to this. After opening the carton it is very difficult to shake the package. With an opened carton in the refrigerator you run the risk of odour contamination. The buttermilk takes on flavours from the other products in the refrigerator. A plastic cap prevents this. Another disadvantage is that the pack needs to stand up straight and uses a lot of space in the fridge. So it is a shame that there is still a plastic cap on the Arla packaging. Fortunately, the cap only causes one percent of the emissions of the total product. We just have to wait for a better solution.

Of all the food produced is never eaten

1.000.000.000 Tons of wasted food per year

Kilo of food per person per year is wasted worldwide

17% Of all food is dumped

Waste and water

[1.9.1] The way we eat now [1.9.2] Food wasted [1.9.3] UNEP report And these are the restaurants and shops that were partially closed for a year because of the Covid-19 Pandemic. And therefore have been backed by the government because they have had no income for a year.

Soup Much of what we consume is virtually pushed down our throats by forces of supply over which we have no control and are only dimly aware. On all sides, our food choices are shaped and constrained by economics. [1.9.1] Humans waste nearly a billion tons of food every year. [1.9.2] This is according to the United Nations ‘Food Waste Index Report 2021.’ [1.9.3] The food we throw away at home averaged seventyfour kilograms per person per year. Worldwide that is. The report also includes data on food waste in restaurants and shops. Seventeen percent of all edible food is dumped. This means that in total almost one third of all food produced is never eaten. So there is also something to be gained there. We almost never throw food away unless it has gone bad. We make soup once a week with all vegetable leftovers. What also helps before you make a shopping list: check what’s in your fridge. You will be amazed of what you can still do with it. Impulse purchases are also better to avoid. And make sure you don’t go shopping when you are feeling hungry. Rice Let’s not talk about meat or fish, but about rice. Rice is an essential food source for the entire world population. Wet rice cultivation has many advantages for farmers. The water kills weeds and rice plants absorb nutrients better from the wet soil. But the cultivation of rice releases methane. Choosing the right cultivation methods can significantly limit the impact on the climate. Rice fields that alternately flood and dry again can emit up to forty-five times more nitrogen oxide. And until we have our vegetarian nasi goreng on the table, a lot of water is once again used in the kitchen. You have to wash rice about five times before you can cook or steam it. Rice contains a lot of starch. By first washing the rice, you wash off that excess starch. This will prevent the rice from clumping. Now that we know this, we choose to eat rice only once a month. You can imagine if that were to happen on a global scale, the climate impact would improve enormously. Avocado Another example that you often read about is the excessive water consumption when growing avocados. The Netherlands imports four hundred and fifteen million kilos of avocados per year. Only thirty-seven million of all those avocados are for the Dutch market. The rest (three hundred and seventy-eight million) are exported to other European countries. Growing an avocado takes about seventy liters of water (our Miele W1 PowerWash 2.0 XL uses forty-nine liters of water for one wash). In addition, the water consumption for growing an avocado in the arid regions of Chile can rise to as much as three hundred and twenty liters. An orange uses twenty-two liters of water and a tomato only five liters. So we eat as little avocados as possible. But are we not allowed to eat avocado’s anymore? No that’s not true. We just need to cut down on these water-guzzling products. So eating a very broad variation of food is the best thing to do.

[1.9.4] 360 magazine

Finishing We've talked about transportation issues before. Fruits are now being transported tens of thousands of kilometers around the globe. Fruits that ripen after they have been harvested often come to the Netherlands by boat. Such a cargo ship emits a lot of soot, but converted per kilo of fruit, this is virtually negligible. Boat transport is not ideal, but it is the most efficient means of transport we currently have. The transport of all food is responsible for only three to four percent of all greenhouse gases. Just a few products are imported by air. This is especially true for sun-ripened tropical fruits, fresh berries, herbs and figs. A comparison: one kilo of papayas arriving by ship from Brazil is responsible for about two kilos of CO2. If those papayas come by plane, it would be nine kilos of CO2. [1.9.4] 45

But are we not allowed to eat anything at all? No. The intention is to, among other things, change our diet. And we do this by mainly eating seasonal food. We are hardly going to eat meat anymore. So eating no meat at all is not an option. It just has to be less. We are going to try to make our diet much more varied. The quality of the food is more important to us than the quantity. This is probably not all we are going to try. There will probably be things that will only become clear in the longer term. Food is important to a person. Although it is quite strange that people are not willing to pay enough for it. Apparently they have no problem with the purchase of the faster than fastest iPhone 12 Pro. And although this has nothing to do with our changing diet, we will not be making long-haul air travel for the time being. And especially no air travel within Europe. Air travel is also extremely uncomfortable. Especially the check-in and check-out procedures that you have to undergo in your socks by now. Constantly waiting and standing in line. The restless children behind who stomp your chair annoyingly during the flight. We put air travel on hold. And with that, the terrible meals that are served during the flight. Organic We choose to grow organic vegetables, fruit and herbs in Oosterwold without using artificial fertilisers or pesticides. That is the basis of our food supply. If we still have to buy something, we pay particular attention to where a product comes from. In November, imported products from Southern Europe are already more climate-friendly and in February this difference is the strongest. In May you can buy tomatoes regionally again. Depending on the time of the year, you also have to deal with fluctuations in the price. It makes eating organic food very complex. That is why seasonal production from your own land is the easiest thing to do. In the next publication, we will start interpreting the data we collected during spring of 2020.

We had no idea if we were able to grow plants and were curious if we could be successful. This was in early summer 2018. So we bought an so called ‘Makkelijke Moestuin Bak’, some mix, nutrition and seeds. We had to build ‘the bak’ from scratch and luckily found an old drill we could use for this. After an productive afternoon ‘the bak’ was ready for planting the seeds. It was an experiment just to see if it would work and whether we are able to grow and care for plants. It turned out to go very well. Everything grows almost by itself. ‘The bak’ had to stand inside our home since we had no balcony. So our future greenhouse should become the ideal habitat. All in all we are now confident that we are doing well with plants.

Resources MVRDV Gemeente Almere 360 Wikipedia WhatsApp Future neighbours Bee Wilson Jesse Klaver Pew Research Center Rebecca Tarbotton United Nations Science Rijksmuseum Naomi Klein Gezond Nu Voedingscentrum Oirschot organics William T. Vollmann Arla Zaanse Hoeve, Albert Heijn Weidemelk Campina

Architects Maak Oosterwold Magazine Nonprofit organization Application Oosterwold Writer Politician and writer Nonpartisan fact tank Writer Organization Magazine Museum Writer Magazine Foundation Biologische tuinbouw Writer Foods Supermarket Foundation Dairy producer

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