We’ve had a busy and exciting week delivering food plants, voluntarily grown by prisoners at HMP Birmingham, out to some of our member groups’ growing sites and community gardens across the city!
We dropped plants off at Rubery Wombles – Deelands Community Garden, Community Environmental Trust, Fircroft College of Adult Education (Fircroft Plantry), Friends of Balaam’s Wood, Ley Hill Community Garden, Marsh Hill Allotments, Friends of Ward End Park, Kushinga Community Garden, Ward End Gardeners Association, Francis Road Allotments, Coplow Street Grow Site, and Livingstone Community Gardens.
Plants included cherry tomatoes, corn, cucumber, a good few different types of beans, beetroot, squash, pumpkins, and more!
There’s a lot to love about this project. For the prisoners involved, it means a real boost for mental health, new skills, and an opportunity to make a positive contribution to society. And once our member groups have nurtured these plants through to harvest, that goodness gets passed on again – with the vegetables going straight to local communities!
We’ll be sharing more as the project develops over the coming months. Massive thanks to everyone who’s been part of it so far – it’s off to a brilliant start!
This project has also been featured in The Times, highlighting the difference gardening is making to the prisoners involved and the journey these plants are taking out into the community. A huge thank you to everyone involved in making this possible – the prisoners and staff at HMP Birmingham, the RHS, and all of the community growing groups nurturing the plants. Read the full article here.