The Golden Carrot was established by the School Gardens Alliance and the Jong Leren Eten programme. Their aim is to put school gardening more firmly on the map in the Netherlands, which is why they have declared May ‘School Garden Month’. Each year during this month, both a large and a smaller municipality that is making an inspiring effort to make school gardening possible will be put in the spotlight. In total, sixteen municipalities were nominated for the award by schools and school garden supporters over the past few weeks.
As a large municipality, Arnhem is committed to city-wide vegetable gardening with the ambition of ‘a school garden for every child’, strongly linked to policy objectives relating to nature, climate, food and sustainability.
The municipality of Teylingen is ensuring that a long tradition of school gardening can continue as part of a broad sustainability approach, and has literally positioned school gardening at the heart of the municipality.
Healthy food
‘Fortunately, more and more municipalities are recognising that the school garden is a good way to give children a great experience in which they encounter healthy food, learn about nature and biodiversity, and engage in physical activity,’ says Arjan Klopstra on behalf of the School Gardens Alliance. ‘The recent attention given to healthy, locally produced food has also contributed to this. When children learn how to sow, care for and harvest their own vegetables, fruit and flowers, their interest in healthy food is stimulated. A home-grown carrot simply tastes best.’
School gardens have existed in some municipalities for more than a hundred years, and many other municipalities also encourage school gardening. This is done in various ways: by making land, materials or subsidies available, or by providing support through, for example, NME (Nature and Environmental Education) centres.
Golden Carrot jury
The Golden Carrot jury consisted of Karin van Hoof, Policy Adviser for Green Capital at the province of North Holland; Roel van Raaij, policy officer at the Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality; Andrew Simons, programme initiator of The Healthy Primary School of the Future and Movare; and Frank Speel, VNG programme manager for Local Democracy.
The jury was pleased with the diverse ways in which municipalities often provide structural support to schools and supporters, and with the way policy themes such as health and biodiversity are linked to this. The jury is also pleased that the time-honoured tradition of school gardening is being revived in many municipalities, with connections being sought with new partners around healthy food and physical activity.