Edible Blue Ridge Summer 2022

D EO RAI is feeding her chickens. It’s early spring and the young hens are running about the garden, scratching up small clouds of dust and the remainder of last sea son’s vegetation. We are standing in one of her many garden plots at a New Roots community garden — a stretch of some eight acres, four under cultivation — bordering Azalea Park in Charlottesville. Moores Creek winds its way in front of us, marking the edge of the gar den and the beginning of the park. A rooster crows impatiently in the corner of the plot, and, as I look more closely at the birds, some appear quite scrawny. “ ose aren’t young, they’re old. e man I bought [the hens] from thought I wanted meat chickens,” Rai explains to me, with the assistance of eresa Allan, manager of the New Roots program. Allan is translating for myself and Rai: Allan speaking in Hindi, Rai in Nepali. Both are using a mix of English (at the time of our interview, we were unable to find a Nepali translator who could meet in person) and though some words and idioms are lost, we are able to understand one another. Rai, originally from Bhutan, came to Char lottseville from Nepal in 2014 with her hus band and two children. “I like to garden.

IRC works in 40 countries and has offices in 26 cities across the U.S. “A lot of IRC work is on the ground,” Allan explains. “Crisis in tervention; short term work. e resettlement offices [such as the one in Charlottesville] are an opportunity for some longer-term support. Food security being top among them. A lot of people coming in have agrarian backgrounds, and want to have access to land, but generally they are settled in cities where there isn’t a lot of land,” says Allan. is is where New Roots steps in. In 2009, the pro gram started putting raised beds outside of refugee apartments. is worked for a short time, but then tenants and the program had to contend with landlords concerned about the potential unsightliness of the beds or perceived exploitation of utilities. So, New Roots sought an alternative, raising money and applying for grants to establish urban agriculture garden ing programs throughout the Charlottesville area. It took a little over seven years to build up the infrastructure, and now the program is in its eleventh season of established commu nity gardens. is season, some sixty families will be growing food in New Roots gardens. “Food security doesn’t mean just having enough calories, but [also] being able to find

Before, when we lived in Nepal and Bhutan, my father farmed the land: corn, rice, veg etables, ginger, turmeric. We had chickens, goats, ducks …” she tells me, as we walk across her fields discussing what she will grow in the upcoming season. Rai joined the New Roots Program in 2016. “We gave a workshop last week on how to keep chickens. We are currently working with a UVA architecture class. Students and gar deners are working together to design chicken coops as a project,” Allan explains as we duck under the low roof that protects the hens from raptors and racoons. Ideally, the coops the stu dents design will be modular, in the event the gardeners have to switch plots, and can also have a roof catchment for water, as water ac cess is another struggle the community gar dens face. is project, and others like it, are just some of the many ways the New Roots Pro gram of the International Rescue Committee (IRC) assists immigrants and refugees in the Charlottesville area. e IRC is a global humanitarian aid and relief organization that responds to world hu manitarian crises, like the crisis in Afghani stan and the war in Ukraine. Currently, the

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