From Inquiry to Academic Writing A Practical Guide, 3rd edition

206 CHAPTER 7 | FRom SummARy To SynTHESiS

nized, local, sustainable food. The company, Growing Com-

munities, uses organic box gardens and small farms to supply

more than 400 homes with weekly deliveries of organic fruits

and vegetables. After a ten-year investment in local farmers

and mini-gardens within the city, Growing Communities is now

financially independent and generates over $400,000 per year

(Willis 53). Compelled by both capitalism and social concern,

Brown’s efforts have shown that community-supported agricul-

ture not only is possible but can be profitable as well! Our own

community agriculture program should not be an entrepreneurial

endeavor, but Brown’s work in London indicates that it need not

be a financial burden to the city either. Rather, the co-op would

be financially self-sufficient, with the potential to generate rev-

enues and fiscal growth in the city.

There are environmental factors that make South Bend

an even better place to launch a profitable community agricul-

ture program than London. Chiefly, South Bend has many more

farms in the immediate vicinity than Ms. Brown could ever have

dreamed of in the U.K. While Brown was limited to twenty-five

local farms within 100 miles of the city, South Bend has over fifty

farms within 25 miles of LaSalle Square (Local Harvest). Offering

a broader production base creates more potential for profits by

decreasing transportation time and increasing product, thereby

making it easier for a coalition to become financially self-

sufficient in a shorter time frame than Ms. Brown’s ten-year plan.

Urban Philadelphia has led the way in demonstrating

the profitability of community solutions to food insecurity

through an offshoot of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society

(PHS) known as Philadelphia Greens. Since the 1970s, this

coalition has reclaimed parks, planted trees, and created com-

munity gardens, both to revitalize the neighborhood and to

serve the nutritionally and economically poor. Through a process

that plants trees, builds wooden fences, and gardens the more

than 1,000 vacant lots of Philadelphia, PHS combines housing

projects and reclaimed space to “green” and reinvigorate the

neighborhood (“The Effects”). Since LaSalle Square is essen-

tially a large empty grassy area at the moment, a community

agricultural co-op should turn this vacant lot and others in

In this paragraph, she

summarizes research

to address the possible

counter-argument.

She again cites

research to address

the counterargument.

Paul 8

14

15

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