About Our Growing Approach - Agroecology:

Agroecology is a form of art, movement, practice, and process of social and ecological transformation that involves the re-evaluation of our sacred relationships with land, water, air, seeds, and food; (re)recognizes humans as co-creators that are an aspect of the planet’s life support systems; values the Afro-Indigenous experience of reality and ways of knowing; visualizes the importance of women and feminine energies as vital to our collective liberation; cherishes ancestral and communal forms of knowledge, experience, and lifeways that began in Africa and continue throughout the Diaspora; and is rooted in the agrarian traditions, legacies, and struggles of the Black experience in the Americas.

 

What we feel is especially unique to our practice of agroecology is our urban context. It’s because we’re situated in an urban context that we find it critical to define what agroecology means for us. More than anything, we hope that this text will capture the spirit of farmer-to-farmer education. The Black Experience in the Americas has always been, by circumstance and by purpose, inextricably tied to the land and to forms of Agrarian Subsistence and Resistance, i.e. Maroon Societies, Quilombolas in Brazil, Palenques in Colombia, Garifuna and the Gullah/ Geechee Peoples, Freedom Farm Cooperative, Carvers Experimentation Wagon, Federation of Southern Co-Ops, Moon Farmers, etc. These historic experiences are both living testaments and examples for our collective study, as we understand and continue organizing efforts that carve out a way forward that supports the liberation of Black People, and the salvation and healing of our Mother Earth.

​

Planned Crops for the 2023 Growing Season:

Below you'll find a listing of the produce we're planning to grow at Oasis Farm & Fishery for the 2023 season. Our Farm features an African American Heritage Garden and we do grow some vegetables that are often hard-to-locate in the Pittsburgh Region.  Our Lagos Spinach is a good example and has been popular with our subscribers and supporters.  Our Farm also includes an accessible Edible Park that is expanding each year. Those crops are not included below; but we hope to add them soon! Please remember that growing conditions, seed availability and other factors vary annually and affect the success rate of our harvests; so please check in with us if you have any questions about the availability of specific items that are shown.