Man turns garden into huge allotment to grow food for needy strangers
A man who turned his garden into a huge allotment during lockdown has handed out thousands of fruit and vegetables to needy strangers.
Self-employed security guard Christopher Jones, 35, found himself out of work when the country was plunged into lockdown during the pandemic. But rather than sit indoors, the dad-of-one decided to try his hand at gardening so that he could save hundreds of pounds growing his own food.
Jones set up 25 beds to grow vegetables in the 120ft by 21ft garden of his rented home in Halton, Cheshire, using YouTube tutorials as a guide. The results were astonishing – in 2020 alone, he grew 55kg of potatoes, 9kg of strawberries, 15kg of carrots, 15 trays of lettuce and seven pumpkins.
Kind-hearted Jones didn’t just grow the food for his own benefit – he was determined to support struggling households in his local area. Most of the produce was advertised on Facebook for struggling people to collect it, free of charge, as they required it.
Jones said: "It was a difficult time for a lot of people. It was about people who were struggling, living off reduced salaries, and people with kids.
“I had a woman come with two small kids, they took everything they could get, they were struggling. Every time something was ready she came and got a load of it because her children weren't getting free school meals."
Mental health benefits
Within a year of starting his home allotment, Jones was growing potatoes, parsnips, pumpkins, sweetcorn, spinach and sprouts.
Apart from small portions he kept aside for his own meals, it was all given away for free. Sometimes people would collect from his home or other nearby locations, such as postboxes.
Jones said gardening is a good way to help people with their physical and mental health as well as save money. He said that as well as veg, he also gave away pots of compost with seeds so people could try gardening for themselves while being stuck at home.
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Jones has since restored his garden to its former state – but he isn't downing his gardening tools altogether and recently took on a proper allotment so he can continue to grow food to donate to people who need it.
He added that his aim is to get people to realise that they “can save a few pounds and grow their own food, and do it organically”.
How popular are allotments?
While setting up an allotment in a garden allows people to grow their own produce at home, not everyone is lucky enough to have a garden. For those people, the path to home growing involves applying for an allotment in a designated area.
However, a surge in the popularity of allotments has meant that there were nearly 175,000 applications stuck on waiting lists in October 2023, according to figures from Greenpeace. They say this shows people want to grow their own food as a way to improve their health, save costs on shopping and reduce their carbon footprint.
Some people have had to wait for up to 15 years to be able to grow their own fruit and vegetables, with waiting lists in England doubling in length since 2011. Campaigners said that in many cases, the number of applications exceeded the total number of plots available.
The city with the longest waiting list was Bristol, with 7,630 applications for allotments. This was followed by Sunderland, Portsmouth, Southampton, Edinburgh and Manchester.
The Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities has been contacted for comment.
