What is Grow Space?

Grow Space works to improve local food resilience and social equity by contributing to hyper-local, circular, regenerative systems in The Fringe Neighbourhood (Kingsland, Morningside, Eden Valley), Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa.

Our vision is for neighbourhoods to have collective wellness through access to healthy food, social connection and sustainable economic activity. To achieve our vision and mission, we run two initiatives in the grounds of Eden Park. Each initiative is designed around our three Pillars of Change:

· EARN: Run hyper-local, circular, regenerative enterprises to improve local food resilience
· LEARN: Grow capability to improve social equity and support regenerative food systems
· SHIFT: Influence attitudes and build community to deliver systems change so that we have an impact

Morningside Urban Market Garden (MUMG)
MUMG builds the skills of women (with a focus on migrant and refugee background women) to supply produce to local businesses and residents. Located on part of the carpark at Eden Park, our teaching garden is home to our Ako Ako programme which trains women to grow food for sale. Our Earn programme is based at both the teaching garden, and MUMG On Walters site. It provides spray free, hyper-local food to local cafes, restaurants and retail outlets and has created paid work for four people. A key aim is to scale the garden, so it generates profits to invest back into both Ako Ako and Grow Space overall.

Morningside Urban Compost Kitchen (MUCK)
MUCK is a neighbourhood scale compost hub to process waste as close to its source as possible and create a local living compost. Located alongside MUMG on Walters at Eden Park, MUCK offers a neighbourhood composting service to local businesses and residents, runs composting workshops and supplies the MUMG gardens with compost. Muck contributes to the MUMG Ako Ako programme and locals can also buy compost from MUCK. A key aim is to create a locally based, circular solution to processing our neighbourhood organic materials, and contribute to the development of regenerative neighbourhood food systems.

Morningside Urban Market Garden

Morningside Urban Market Garden (MUMG) is a community enterprise that teaches and shares skills as it grows organic produce for market. Currently operating across two sites in the grounds of Eden Park, MUMG supplies spray-free organic microgreens, salad leaves and edible flowers to a number of local cafes, restaurants and retail outlets. Locals can also order directly. Delivered by e-bike, our produce is hyper-local with many of our customers located within a kilometre of the garden.

MUMG is also home to Ako Ako, a training programme for women (with a focus on migrant and refugee background women) to learn about the business of urban market gardening. Each year Ako Ako has a new intake of women who, for twelve weeks, learn everything about running an urban market gardening business.

The focus for Ako Ako is on women because women are most commonly the provider of food in a household. As well, having access to a micro income that can be generated around other household and community commitments can make a significant improvement to the economies of both individual women and their households. Graduating women are encouraged to start their own enterprises before they leave the programme and produce from these gardens can be sold into the markets MUMG has secured. The women also have the opportunity to work in the garden in paid roles as these become available. This programme is fees free for participants.

MUMG’s key aims are to:

Grow business and market gardening skills among women
Supply hyper-local organic produce to local cafes and businesses
Generate profits that are invested back into the enterprise
Support the development of purposeful social connections
Contribute to the development of local regenerative food systems

MUMG has been supported by a wide range of individuals, groups and organisations in a range of ways since 2018. A full list of supporters is here.

THE AKO AKO PROGRAMME

A fees free training programme for women (with a focus on migrant and refugee background women) to learn about the business of urban market gardening.

Grounded in regenerative organic principles, the programme takes participants on a practical journey of developing their gardening knowledge, and skills to set up, and run an urban market gardening business. Through a combination of workshops, and hands on garden sessions, participants will learn regenerative organic food growing skills, and gain practical experience in small-scale market gardening. The knowledge covered in the programme ranges from composting, soil health, crop planning and harvesting to accounting, and business models.

Come Learn With Us !

Develop new growing and business skills, and meet local people
Build on skills you already have to create a small business growing micro-greens and edible flowers
Gain an opportunity to work as part of a team, and get experience in a supportive New Zealand community workplace
Learn new words and practice your English.

Ako Ako Programme Outline

Ako Ako Schedule

Ako Ako takes place one day a week from 9am to 1.30pm over 14 weeks. Our next programme will be running from April – July 2023.

Register

Applications for Ako Ako 2023 are open until 5pm on Wednesday 8th March 2023.

The Minani family have always been farmers. In their homeland of Burundi in Africa, that’s what everyone has always done. Olive Minani joined the MUMG team in 2018 to better understand the growing conditions in Aotearoa, so she could share her love of growing organic food for her whanau and community.

“Being a part of MUMG has helped me meet local people and make friends, showed me how to manage the seasons, and what to plant and when in New Zealand”

Olive shares her range of delicious organic produce at a selection of local markets each week, stop by for a chat the next time you are at Wesley Market, Te Puna Market, or Otara Market or click and collect from the farm gate.

Our Sites

MUMG Teaching Garden

Generously supported by Eden Park Trust, Watercare and Ghella Abergeldie JV, our Eden Park teaching garden is built on part of the car park. This not only uses underutilised public space in innovative ways, it also complements efforts by Park staff to incorporate more sustainable practices such as composting and bee keeping within the stadium grounds.

Hosting 30 raised garden beds, a tunnel house, composting systems and harvesting area. The teaching garden is the hub of the MUMG operation, here we host our Ako Ako programme, grow and harvest microgreens, edible flowers, and organic produce, while testing a range of crops and harvesting systems.

MUMG On Walters

Co-located alongside our compost hub at Eden Park, MUMG On Walters provides an opportunity for the team to develop techniques and local knowledge about how to productively grow food in our neighbourhood, while working within natural systems to regenerate soil and local ecosystems.

Since 2021 MUMG has developed an additional fifteen no-till garden beds, a tunnel house, and watering systems. Efforts are focused on scaling our growing capacity, better understanding our context, and local micro-climate, and different planting and propagation strategies.

You are welcome to visit and enjoy MUMG respectfully at any time. Growers will be there several times each week. Best times to talk with you are on Wednesday mornings.

You can be part of MUMG by volunteering in the garden, offering donations of expertise, goods, or time, and supporting our local businesses.

You can buy our produce for home from Common Sense Organics, The Nest Kingsland, or through our subscription services or Grow at Home range. Other suggestions for contributing are most welcome!

Please be aware that our sites are working market gardens and there may be health and safety hazards.

Collaborators

Supporters

Morningside Urban Compost Kitchen

RECYCLING NUTRIENTS LOCALLY !

MUCK is a social enterprise that provides a local-level solution to capturing our organic waste resources in the neighborhood. We take food, and organic waste from the community and turn it into living compost. This helps to support community growing initiatives, and is another step in creating a neigbourhood scale circular economy.

MUCK has been partnering with local businesses and residents since 2020, to provide a neighbourhood composting service for locals who don’t have the space or time to compost. Turning our resources into beautiful living compost to restore our soils, and support growing local food. MUCK offers a weekly neighbourhood drop off, and E-bike collection service to locals in the fringe neighbourhood, hosts composting workshops, and supplies local gardeners with locally made living compost.

MUCK’s aims are to:

Develop a social enterprise model, and systems which support the local composting of organic material from residents and businesses.
Supply local living compost to community growing initiatives.
Support neighbourhood compost literacy and awareness.
Support the development of purposeful social connections.
Contribute to the development of local regenerative food systems.

How it works

Sign up
To get started, select the subscription which best suits your needs.

Start Collecting
During the week, start collecting your household food scraps. We recommend a sealable bucket or tupperware that fits in your kitchen and can be easily carried to the hub. Let us know if we can help with this. Most food scraps and household compostables are accepted, but there are a few exceptions. See our full list of accepted items here.

Walk, Bike or Skate to the hub
When your kitchen bucket is full, make your way to the hub or place your caddy out for collection! Check out our local collection area here.

We encourage people to make their way using bike, skateboards, scooters, walking or even public transport. The hub or drop off point should be close enough to not need to drive.

Drop Off
Once at the hub, use the pin code to unlock the padlock on the bin. Place your food scraps into the bin, close, and lock the bin again.

Repeat
We’ll take care of recycling all that food scrappy goodness into amazing living soil. So just keep the cycle going!