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Community gardens, farmers’ markets start seasons with COVID precautions

Measures to control the spread of COVID-19 aren’t impacting Sunshine Coasters’ access to locally grown food, but they are changing some of the ways they get that access.
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Signs remind volunteers to follow measures to stop the spread of COVID-19 while working at the Ocean Vegetables Community Garden in Sechelt.

Measures to control the spread of COVID-19 aren’t impacting Sunshine Coasters’ access to locally grown food, but they are changing some of the ways they get that access.

When it declared a public health emergency just over a month ago, the province listed food cultivation – including farming, livestock, community gardens, subsistence agriculture and farmers’ markets – as essential services.

After closing its community garden plots on Lamprey Lane in Sechelt early in the pandemic, Sunshine Coast Community Services has announced they are reopened “with new safety precautions and protocols in place.”

The announcement on the Community Services website thanks the plot holders “who passionately wrote in ideas about social distancing and their commitment to health and safety,” but cautions that “while community gardens have been listed as an essential service, if the new safety protocols and precautions are not followed they will need to be closed.”

Community Services said it will reevaluate the protocols at the end of April to see if it needs to make any changes.

Gardeners are being asked not to tend their plots if they’ve been out of the country in the past 14 days, had contact with anyone who has been out of the country or has COVID-19, or themselves have symptoms of COVID-19.

Community Services is also putting precautions in place around the compost and water system.

The One Straw Society’s Ocean Vegetables Community Garden, which is planted beside the sidewalk on Ocean Avenue in downtown Sechelt, is also open with special protocols in place.

The society operates the garden as a “free for all to harvest” garden and said they “plan to grow as much food for our community as space allows” this season.

The other major source of locally grown food for Coast residents, the farmers’ markets, have been restricted in what vendors can sell as a result of an order from provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry, but encouraged to stay open.

The Sechelt Farmers’ and Artisans Market has been operating through an online portal at www.secheltmarket.com, with order pickup downtown at its usual location. The first pickup day was April 11 and, in a post on Facebook, market organizers said it was a huge success.

The Roberts Creek Farm Gate Market started its season April 15, following new social distancing and cleaning protocols.

Roberts Creek’s other market, the Community Farm Market, is temporarily closed, but many of its vendors as well as those who would normally be involved in markets in Gibsons have gone online through the Gibsons Farm Collective at http://www.gibsonsfarmcollective.com

The One Straw Society has also started work on an update to its Green Banner Guide to local food vendors at www.onestraw.ca