An urban plot with a sustainable ending

Oosterwold residents must grow food on at least half their property, leading to creative solutions

- Hannah Docter-Loeb

When Marco de Kat starts planning his meals, he doesn't need to travel far for fresh food. Right outside his house is an 800 sq metre plot with all sorts of produce-apples, pears, peppers, basil, beetroot and cauliflower, to name a few. During the winter months, he and his wife can pretty much survive off the vegetables stored in their freezer. Even after living in Oosterwold for a number of years, it's something that still excites him.

"Yesterday, I forgot to think about what to eat," he said. "You walk through your garden and you find something and that's what you eat."

Oosterwold, where De Kat has lived since 2017, is a 4,300-hectare urban experiment located east of Amsterdam, in a suburb of Almere, where De Kat works as a municipal councillor. First visualised about a decade ago by a local network, it was established by local government and Oosterwold planners as a way to challenge the rigidity of Dutch city planning, giving people more freedom and responsibility over urban design.

"This rule - if you want to live in Oosterwold, you have to produce food on at least 50% of your property - is very unique thinking in the world, and makes it also an outstanding area in many ways," said Jan Eelco Jansma, a researcher at Wageningen University & Research, who has studied in Almere for years and inspired the city to include urban agriculture in the planning of Oosterwold.