Does 4-h Have A Future In Big Cities

By: Terena Bell

There’s not much call for the meat judging team in Manhattan, but kids here should learn how to take soil samples. Maybe if they had, when volunteer melons started growing in the median of Broadway this summer, people would have known whether it was safe to eat them.

In a city where 80 percent of the ground is covered by asphalt, it’s easy to ask whether agricultural programs like FFA or 4-H have a place. In farming terms, Manhattan is small — just 14,528 acres — but with 1.64 million people living on it, you’d think the island was all-encompassing. Few here could grow their own food, if not from lack of knowledge than of space. At the farmers’ market, “local” peaches from Pennsylvania sell for $3 each. New Yorkers buy them without thinking — never mind if they’re ripe. Like other talents rural residents take for granted, knowing what’s in season is not a life skill in the city. How could it be? Asphalt and people are everywhere.