Compost comeback: How City Farmer is keeping backyard composting alive in Vancouver

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Nestled in one of Vancouver’s most historic neighbourhoods is City Farmer, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to composting and urban agriculture education. 

Their office, located at 2150 Maple Street, is tucked in a luscious Kitsilano demonstration garden which boasts a wide variety of trees and plants, including a mulberry tree for silk making, hops for their own beer label, and many different ways to compost. 

Michael Levenston is the executive director of City Farmer and has been with the organization for over 46 years. 

“Composting is central to growing food at home,” Levenston says. 

“We love it because you’re taking all the waste that you make [from] your kitchen scraps, leaves, [and] garden waste, and [turning] it into fertilizer, which then grows the food you eat at home.”

Their long-standing role in the community solidifies them as composting experts and has made them a central hub for composting education in the city.

“It [creates] a cycle when you’re finished with the food, it goes in the compost bucket, [which] goes to the back [to compost] makes nutrients for more food,” Levenston says. 

What started as a news publication in 1978 became an organization in 1981, with a garden to demonstrate what people can do with composting and urban agriculture at their houses. 

Over the past three decades, City Farmer has partnered with the City of Vancouver to offer subsidized backyard compost bins to anyone who wishes to purchase them. The bins, which generally cost upwards of $100 at big-box stores, sell for $35 at City Farmer. 

Backyard composting at home still serves an important purpose, even though city-wide compost pick-up programs have become commonplace in most major municipalities. 

“In an urban environment, people are usually very disconnected [from] the Earth. We don’t know how food is being made in the first place. Some kids even grew up never even seeing a skin of the fruit,” says Justin Lau, a gardener with City Farmer who studied human geography at Simon Fraser University. 

“It’s very important that people actually learn the process and [are] able to keep their waste local to decrease their carbon footprint.”

Using the subsidized bins is simple for those with accessible yard space. Those with a bin can place it on the ground and add layers of leaves, food waste except meat and fish products, and garden scraps except large branches. Microorganisms will come up through the open bottom to aid the breakdown and create compost. 

“If you use that process, leaves, kitchen scraps, garden waste, chopped up in layers in that bin, over six to eight months, you’ll get soil underneath that you’ll then put in your bed to grow food,” Levenston says. 

Marty Logan is a local resident who has been composting at home for over 30 years. 

“It’s just a good place to throw stuff … leftover lettuce, leaves, and [other things], it’s just so convenient,” Logan says. 

“I spread it out over the garden even amongst the flowers and then most years I end up with a bunch of tomato plants growing in the middle. … The best tomatoes we grow are the ones that come from the compost seeds. [It’s] dead easy, it’s so simple.” 

For more information about backyard composting, contact City Farmer’s compost hotline at 604-736-2250, visit their website at cityfarmer.eco/, or drop in for a tour of the demonstration garden.