An urban farmer has created a multi-locational network of backyard farms across Moruya.
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Andrew Baker is pioneering for urban-based, small-scale intensive mixed gardening to produce local food, and he is eying off unused land across Moruya.
Mr Baker started growing food for the SAGE Farmers' Markets in the backyard of his Evan's Street home in 2018.
The former public servant applied all the knowledge he had learnt through an internship at Allsun Farm Gundaroo under Joyce Wilkie - now farm manager at Stepping Stones Farm.
He said small scale intensive gardening was "like keeping a hell of a lot of balls in the air at once", but there's nothing he would rather be doing.
Mr Baker started at Evans Street, but established a second branch of the farm in Womban when his property flooded. In April this year, he added another site in Queen Street and also is starting a plot in a community-donated backyard in Thomas Street.
Each of the four sites has 'no-dig' beds and is lined with vegetables at different stages of growing. Mr Baker has folders full of scheduling and plans, outlining what needs to be planted when and where. The four sites he currently manages produce "a couple of ute loads" of vegetables each week.
He is getting ready to launch his own weekly table at the SAGE Farmer's Markets, but also sells through Southlands Grocer and the SAGE E-markets.
The produce Mr Baker piles high onto a table at the Farmer's Markets was in the ground just five hours earlier. Freshness is just one of the strengths he sees in the farming model he advocates for.
Endless possibilities for growth
Andrew sees a harvest of benefits to the urban farming model.
"The product is local, generally higher quality and farmers can pay more attention to their product," he said.
"Using land productivity that otherwise wouldn't be used is a great reason to do it.
"This is a benign way of making food."
The practice is far more popular in North America and parts of Europe than in Australia, and Mr Baker would love to see more and more urban gardens supplying food for the community.
"I don't think we've even scratched the surface of demand in Moruya," he said.
"We'll pile the table high and it flies - we hardly ever come home with anything."
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He sees a future of endless possibilities, with tangible positive benefits for the community.
"If we had another two dozen growers around this place, just think what would happen," he said.
"The room to grow is huge.
"It needs to grow and I don't see any limit to that happening."
When Mr Baker drives around Moruya in his ute, he can't help but check out people's garden's as he passes by. His mind is always calculating what gardens have the right aspect, slope and space for urban gardening.
"Look at all the un-used ground in Moruya," he said.
"If people have land they don't want, there might just be a farmer interested."