Bellarine Community Health (BCH) has been named as one of 36 finalists in the 2022 Victorian Health Promotion Awards.
BCH was selected for its commitment to the health and wellbeing of communities across Victoria.
There are nine award categories, and the BCH Youth Guerrilla Garden is a finalist in the Future Healthy Award category. The award recognises a health promotion organisation or program working with young people facing greater barriers to improve their health and wellbeing.
“This is wonderful recognition for this pilot project,” BCH health planner Laura Boehm said.
“We established the Youth Guerrilla Garden in June 2021, when a group of dynamic young Bellarine residents attended the first Youth Guerrilla Garden working bee and created a beautiful youth community garden at the back of headspace Ocean Grove.”
During regular workshops and working bees the young gardeners learnt to build wicking garden beds, create worm farms, and seasonal planting and growing organic vegetables.
They’ve also held cooking workshops where the youth participants created meals with produce they had grown.
The idea for the Guerrilla Garden stemmed from Californian resident and ‘original Gangsta Gardner’ Ron Finley. His Ted Talk on Guerrilla Gardening sparked a gardening revolution.
He is famous for planting fruit and vegetable gardens in various public locations like nature strips and old car lots across South Central Los Angeles.
Climate change and the impact on the mental health and wellbeing of young people was another motivator to start the project.
“We are seeing an increase of young people feeling distressed about the state of the planet,” Ms Boehm said.
“Youth voice on climate change has never been more important and the creation of initiatives that empower young people to develop their leadership skills and become change agents in their communities are vital.”
The award winners will be announced at a ceremony in February 2023.
