As the harvest season draws to a close, it is a good time of year to offer an update on how 2024 has been on The Haxby Road Community allotment project for sanctuary seekers. It’s been a year of growth!

Written by project leads: Dr Hannah Spring, Associate Professor-  Research and Evidence-Based Healthcare and Dr Fiona Howlett, Senior Lecturer- Occupational Therapy 

 

Occupational therapy and social justice at the allotment

The Haxby Road Community allotment project, working alongside sanctuary seekers was established in 2020 by Dr’s Fiona Howlett and Hannah Spring as a venture combining and being underpinned by the principles of occupational therapy and our passion for social justice.  With support from funding bodies such as the Smile Foundation for green social prescribing, York City Council funded initiative Growing Green Spaces, and more recently funding from the NHS, the project has developed progressively over the past four years.  Participating in meaningful occupations is a fundamental aspect of the human experience and crucial to health and well-being.  Those seeking asylum or refugee status in the UK encounter significant barriers to integration which can often limit opportunities to participate in society, engage in meaningful activities and live an authentic life.  This issue goes to the very heart of the work occupational therapists do to improve quality of life.

The community allotment is a collaboration set up with York based sanctuary seekers to provide opportunities to engage in gardening and horticulture as a meaningful activity whilst at the same time aiding connectivity and integration to the community. The allotment provides a social space for people to share their skills, learn new ones, and grow produce which helps to promote health and wellbeing.  The project places a strong emphasis on social justice and is a collaboration between occupational therapy staff and students at York St John University and also staff, volunteers, and service users at York City of Sanctuary and Refugee Action York. 

A growing community

From very small beginnings coinciding with the start of the 2020 pandemic, the community allotment project for sanctuary seekers has continued to develop and grow.  Our ambition for this project has always been that with support from volunteers, students and the wider community, the allotment would become self-sustaining and be run primarily by sanctuary seekers with support from occupational therapy students. Sustained community engagement, making links and connections, offering events and advertising the project widely is key to the success of the project.  This process has taken much time and effort in building trusting relationships and part of this has been focussed on the active involvement of sanctuary seekers in allotment developments to determine what they want from the community allotment. 

The power of growing and sharing food

We have found that community events in which people come together to share food and produce are culturally relevant and hold meaning for people.  The events naturally act as a springboard for ideas, networking and further community engagement, and are always well attended.  Having identified that this is an effective way to connect with the community we have worked hard to establish two key events in the growing season and have been running these successfully since 2021.  These include a summer family BBQ and a harvest and pumpkin carving event in the autumn.  However this year, things grew for us in other ways and 2024 has been an amazing year for us!

In February, NHS funding presented us with the opportunity to set up a role-emerging placement for occupational therapy students.  The role emerging placement kicked off the season, running from March to May, and then our students opting for the Students as Co-Researchers (SCoRe) project (linked to their final year research study) took over, running things through until autumn.  These two initiatives helped give us the consistency and continuity we needed to establish and support a regular community of sanctuary seekers to become part of a weekly allotment group.  This was always our key ambition for the project and to have achieved it feels fantastic!

This year our summer BBQ event was attended by over 50 people (our largest attendance yet) including sanctuary seekers, other members of the Haxby Road allotment, students, and staff from Refugee Action York.  The growing season traditionally culminates with our family harvest and pumpkin carving event in the half term week and this year we had record numbers in attendance!  Children and family alike enjoyed pumpkin carving, seasonal treasure hunts, games, and even a fire performance from a member of the staff team!  The growing community of sanctuary seekers at the allotment is heartwarming and this year we have gone from strength to strength.  Feedback from the refugees has been extremely positive – we have seen them keenly showing up each week, invested in the nurturing of the produce they have been growing, and excited to get involved and take ownership of the allotment space.  Whilst this year, we had quite a battle with rain and slugs it certainly didn’t deter anyone!  Our sanctuary seekers were keen to grow foods that were of cultural relevance to them, and through this activity many stories were shared and friendships and connections were forged. 

Our work at the allotment ultimately aims to address issues of social justice by offering meaningful opportunities to sanctuary seekers, but also through offering students the opportunity to engage in the project as Students as Co-Researchers.  In this respect we are helping to decolonize the curriculum by preparing students for work in a multi-cultural society.  We also help to raise awareness of forced global migration and the impact of marginalisation on refugee communities in the UK, and supporting students to transition from the University to the wider world as compassionate citizens.

Other outputs from this ongoing project include research papers, presentations and workshops at international conferences, and the following video showcasing the impact of SCoRe projects with sanctuary seekers on the student experience (this includes the allotment but also other projects we have worked on with sanctuary seekers in Stockton). Watch the short film which features interviews with staff and students from the BSc Occupational Therapy programme on YouTube.

Thank you!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has been involved in this community allotment initiative.  Year on year, this support allows us to provide a meaningful nature-based space to support the health and wellbeing of sanctuary seekers, and their integration into the community of York.  As our season at the allotment has now drawn to a close, this gives us time to reflect on our achievements this year, and to very much look forward to season 2025.