The Joy of Connection

One of the joys of being an Incredible Edible group is the knowledge that across the UK and the world there are people working on similar projects in their villages, towns and cities.

Whether growing food, sharing skills or supporting local economies it’s wonderful to know that there are others not just doing the same thing, but willing to share their tales and support each other.

With this in mind it’s always a great event when regions get together and chat about what they are doing and how they are getting on. Sharing successes, failures and problems and hearing about plans for the future from groups that might be fairly close to each other or from other areas in the UK. And last Saturday, which saw the groups across the North West of England come together, was a great example of this. 12 groups. Incredible Edible Prestwich and District hosted the event at the Barn in Philips Park and there were over 40 Incredible Edibles attend, including our founder Pam, and the north west regional facilitator, Ian Bocock, of Incredible Education. Talks came from Pam, Gary, our Network Director, and Mike who manages the network. Other organisations joined in with the event too, who share our aims and are Incredible in all but name. It really was a meeting of a network of networks.

Lots was discussed, issues were spoken about and food was shared. From our Polish friends who expressed their fears for the future down to Brexit and who came along and shared and cooked foraged mushrooms, to groups sharing concerns around climate, biodiversity and how to engage with everyone in their communities, bread was broken and the north west network of groups strengthened by their tales, their similarities and shared work to connect their communities through food and kindness and the knowledge that there truly is far more that connects us than there are differences.

Thanks to Matt from Incredible Edible Mossley for the photo!!