On February 3rd, Justin Munroe from Grow Nashua addressed the Rotary Club of Nashua regarding Grow Nashua. Justin Munroe, a fourth generation Nashua native and the Executive Director of Grow Nashua. Volunteering throughout the community has inspired him to create a true “teach a man to fish” organization to serve our community.
Grow Nashua’s focus is to bring families together with a common goal of strengthening their community. This is being achieved by providing the education and resource’s families and children need to grow, prepare and consume healthy food, while simultaneously creating jobs and ecological stewardship opportunities.
In 2019 their Growing Education program reached 760 students with over 1,200 hours of teaching, their Growing Spaces provided 255 residents with places to grow food, and their Food Scrap Collection Service has diverted 62,000 pounds of food waste from the city’s landfill while creating job opportunities that employ three of our program participants.
Grow Nashua is growing urban vegetable farms in our city and schools and using this common ground to empower people to strengthen their own community relationships.
Working among Nashua's schools, businesses, and diverse residents they are providing the backbone for communication to support the local food system and positively impact the overall health of the community. All programs offered cohesively fit together to give participants the education and resources they need to grow, cook, and eat healthy; as well as advocate for their local food system. There four major areas of focus are: Urban Growing Spaces; Gardener Growing Education; School Growing Education; and Cooking Courses.
Grow Nashua has an active composting program whereby they collect food scraps from residents. They provide buckets and pick them up, thus providing a nutrient rich compost for soil. They provide garden training, how to grow and how to grow more efficiently. Grow Nashua partners with the NH Food Bank to offer a 6-week cooking course, held at the First Church in Nashua. They also partner with local schools to teach gardening, nutrition, wellness, all related to gardening.
Their gardens use a wicking irrigation system for their watering, which uses 90% less water consumption than traditional hoses.