The Problems: Why OASIS?
OASIS is an integrated hub that offers an elegant solution to a compound of problems.
Below is a list of high-level problems that OASIS addresses.
Growing inequality: To access healthy food, you have to be able to afford it.
Climate Chaos: Climate change is no longer just an issue for the future. The food system is a major player in climate change, both in what’s causing it, and what will be most affected.
During 2007-2016, Agriculture, Forestry, and Other Land Use (AFOLU) activities were responsible 23% of the total human-caused greenhouse gas emissions between 2007-2016 (IPCC). This number jumps as high as 37% percent if you also include all the pre- and post-production activities in the global food system. Monoculture farming, high pesticide, herbicide and fertilizer use, and deforestation for grazing land are major culprits. As is food transportation and distribution processes that lead to a lot of wasted food.
A changing climate also means a lot of stress on our food system. Unpredictable and extreme weather threaten the survival of our crops, particularly through unseasonable droughts, floods, changes in temperature, shifting growing seasons, and new diseases/pests who migrate with the changing temperature.
With the global nature of our food system, it’s not just threats to our local farms. Canada for example relies heavily on produce from California, which faces rising sea levels, extreme droughts, and forest fires. When crops fail, prices rise drastically, increasing hunger and social unrest.
It’s clear that we need to change the way we do food. OASIS ensures we can grow food all-year round, and no matter what the weather may bring, by growing underground and in greenhouses, with back-up power and rainwater catchment. The efficiencies of the OASIS system also mean less pressure on our planet: less water use, no chemical additions to soil, and drastically reduced food waste and food transportation.
Growing inequality: To access healthy food, you have to be able to afford it.
Poverty affects millions of Canadians, and aligned with global trends, the situation is only getting worse. Income inequality in Canada has increased over the past 20 years. https://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/Details/society/income-inequality.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1
Meeting basic needs: “Eating healthy food is expensive, people are on very tight budget, now you need phone and internet, and a big chunk of their money goes to rent.” – St James Town resident in 2017 Timebank Study
Poverty is food insecurity. As Community Foods Centers Canada notes, “people often feel shame and stigma when they ask for help. Individuals who can’t afford healthy food suffer more from physical and mental health problems. As inequality grows, our communities are becoming more isolated and fragmented. That affects us all.” Community Food Centers Canada.
Food Waste and Pollution: In Canada, we are wasting valuable food waste and emitting tonnes of carbon in the process!
Did you know that Canada is one of the biggest wasters of food on the planet? The Commission for Environmental Cooperation calculated that on an annual basis over 870 pounds of food per capita are lost or wasted! https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/04/03/canadians-are-among-the-heaviest-wasters-of-food-on-the-planet-report-finds.html
This a huge waste, especially considering how many Canadians go hungry, or struggle to put food on the table every day. But the problem goes even deeper than that. The decomposition of organic waste in our landfills produces methane, a greenhouse gas 25x more potent than CO2 when it comes to environmental impact (IPBES).
Most urban high rises don’t have compost bins, and even for the many houses that do, this food waste is not always processed properly. Some is converted to healthy soil, but some is just placed in heaping piles like a landfill. This produce methane AND misses out on the huge potential to produce healthy soil and natural fertilizers for our farms and gardens.
OASIS wants to process waste on site, turning food scraps into high-quality soil. OASIS also helps prevent food waste in the first place through education, and by producing food on site, thereby eliminating a lot of food waste that happens in transportation and grocery stores.
Rising climate refugee population: Canada will be home to a growing number of refugees, how will we support them?
OASIS was designed in St. James Town, an arrival neighbourhood for migrants and refugees in downtown Toronto; and, was originally developed as a response by and for newcomers.
OASIS supports self-reliance and belonging that can help newcomers transition into healthy and happy lives in Canada, countering a worrying trend of immigrant health decline within the first five years of living in Canada. Source: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/51633623_Health_Decline_Among_Recent_Immigrants_to_Canada_Findings_From_a_Nationally-representative_Longitudinal_Survey
On a deeper level, OASIS food hubs can prevent refugees from falling into the same crisis in Canada that they tried to escape back home; namely, food insecurity as a result of environmental and economic shocks.
What is a climate refugee and how do we know it’s a crisis?
“Best estimates,” the Canadian government tells us in a 2010 report (Climate Change and Forced Migration: Canada’s Role), “suggest that hundreds of millions of people could be on the move in the coming decades due to the impacts of climate change. Canada has an opportunity now to plan an orderly and effective response to the coming crisis.” Source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/canada-climate-refugees-1.5165029 )
Climate migration is a complicated subject, and as the world struggles to name and negotiate this new movement of people, alarming numbers of people across the planet are being forced to migrate because of extreme weather, conflict, and economic distress caused by climate change.
Whether it is citizens of small island states Kiribati and Tuvalu whose lands are disappearing under rising sea levels, the two million + refugees from the civil war in Somalia driven in part by extreme droughts and food shortages brought on by human-induced climatic changes, the 11 million people displaced in the 2010 Pakistan floods, the 4 million displaced in the 2013 Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, or internal migrants fleeing fires and pollution within Canada; the numbers are rising, and fast.
What does an effective response to this crisis look like? In part, it means preparing social and physical infrastructure to support refugees and climate migrants once they arrive in Canada. We need faster ways for migrants to have their valuable education degrees re-certified in Canada. And, we need programs for self-reliance that help newcomers transition into self-sustaining and contributing citizens in timely supportive ways.