Schools take over section of Sheffield Market as kids try their hand at farming
Four schools from across Sheffield get their hands dirty
First it was Jeremy Clarkson.
Now these Sheffield school pupils have become the latest people from South Yorkshire to try their hands at farming.
And while they may not have got their own Clarkson’s Farm-style TV series out of it, The Star was there to get pictures as they went about selling their vegetables to the general public in the city centre.
The Young Marketeers Sheffield Market Day came after they had grown their own vegetables over the last few months. The schools taking part were Clifford All Saints C of E Primary School, Emmaus Catholic Primary School, Norfolk Community Primary School and Oasis Fir Vale Academy.
On Wednesday morning (July 15), youngsters from the four primary schools took over a section of Sheffield Market to sell the produce they have spent the last few months growing. They had grown crops ranging from potatoes to courgettes at their schools, with help from the charity School Food Matters.
Kate Sturdey, who was running the scheme in Sheffield, said the project was teaching youngsters about where their food comes from, and the money raised would go to a Sheffield charity, Open Kitchen.
She said: “The children have absolutely loved it. They’ve had so much fun.
“They initially can be a bit hesitant about putting their hands in the soil, getting their hands dirty. By the end, they’ve got mucky nails, they’ve got dirty hands, and they’re trying vegetables that they’ve never had before. They’re enjoying things like radishes, courgettes, things that they maybe didn’t know what they looked like before, and didn’t know how they were grown, had never tasted them. Now they’re tasting them and telling the public about them.
“It’s a seed to fork programme, so its teaching them that the food starts as seeds, how it grows, and then it doesn’t just stop there, they then go through the process of harvesting it, and today is the selling it, so as if they were a farmer themselves they are taking their produce to market.”