Allotments v Farms

Urban allotments could be as productive as traditional farms while using fewer pesticides, new research has found.
https://wickedleeks.riverford.co.uk/news...szp1CWKtcY

"The growers harvested on average one kg of insect-pollinated fruit and vegetables, such as tomatoes, beans, strawberries, and apples per square metre.

Researchers calculated that the average harvest at an allotment would be worth £550, based on the cost of organic produce at the supermarket. They also worked out that £310 of this produce was insect-pollinated, highlighting the importance of insects and biodiversity in growing food."

One kg per square metre?  How many lettuces weigh a kg? I suppose they weighed everything they harvested and divided it by the square metres of the allotment. Does this include paths, compost heaps, sheds or is it just growing space.

What do you think your output is? Apples, tomatoes, beans are good heavy croppers but I'd struggle to grow a kg/sq.m over the whole garden. Wouldn't want to actually.

It would be interesting to work out our own version of KG per square meter.
I think one KG per square meter would be doable. Especially if weight was averaged out over the whole growing space and you grow beans, tomatoes, courgettes, pumpkins. You know heavy veg     .

I think an allotment is pretty packed compared to garden growers? I don't grow anywhere near that and never have but I pop to our local allotments occasionally to see a friend. He has been growing on his for about 10years and not an inch of space is wasted.

# how much can you crop from a rhubarb? I've got 5..there's a fair amount in a couple of sticks and it keeps on coming. We take stuff like that for granted?

I think 1kg per square metre is very achievable, especially if you're getting more than one crop out of the space per year i.e. spring, summer and winter harvests.

Crops which I know give me more than that:

garlic - 2kg/sqm
potatoes (in pots) - 10+kg/sqm
tomatoes - 13kg/sqm (1.8 sqm border in the greenhouse produced 24kg of tomatoes, if two hadn't died early it would've been closer to 30kg)

Lighter things like leaves don't give you much all at once but spread over a long time I bet we're getting well over 1kg of lettuce from two trough planters. It would be interesting to track everything but honestly I'd give up a few weeks in 

Another extract:-

Researchers at the University of Sussex and volunteer urban growers in Brighton and Hove found that allotmenteers grew over 70 kg of produce on average in one season, a range they said was within productivity levels on conventional non-organic farms, with limited pesticide use.

A full size allotment is 250sq m so, unless the  Brighton plots are quarter plots - shouldn't they be growing more than 70kg - maybe 200kgs?

I think 1kg per square metre is very achievable, especially if you're getting more than one crop out of the space per year i.e. spring, summer and winter harvests.

Crops which I know give me more than that:

garlic - 2kg/sqm
potatoes (in pots) - 10+kg/sqm
tomatoes - 13kg/sqm (1.8 sqm border in the greenhouse produced 24kg of tomatoes, if two hadn't died early it would've been closer to 30kg)

Lighter things like leaves don't give you much all at once but spread over a long time I bet we're getting well over 1kg of lettuce from two trough planters. It would be interesting to track everything but honestly I'd give up a few weeks in 

I would love to track it all too - but can't be bothered  I would like to know how many kilos of gooseberries the birds ate too!

Another extract:-

Researchers at the University of Sussex and volunteer urban growers in Brighton and Hove found that allotmenteers grew over 70 kg of produce on average in one season, a range they said was within productivity levels on conventional non-organic farms, with limited pesticide use.

A full size allotment is 250sq m so, unless the  Brighton plots are quarter plots - shouldn't they be growing more than 70kg - maybe 200kgs?

It says one season? Maybe they split it over 3 or 4 - spring/summer/autumn/winter winter crops  are pretty heavy?

Going back to TMTT's lettuce planters, I've been looking at those salad bags of loose leaves that they sell in Morries for an idea of weights. Such a wide range - from 60g to 250g per bag. https://groceries.morrisons.com/browse/f...ves-183971
One kg = 4 big bags or, say, 10 average bags @ about £1 a bag or £10 a kilo.
It soon adds up if you use that sort of valuation.

I have been doing some calculating. I aim to eat 10 portions of fruit and veg a day (excluding potatoes). One full portion of most things is about 80g, so that's 800g per day or 292kg per year.

My back garden has around 95 square metres of growing space, so I would need to manage more than 3kg per square metre in order to grow all of my fruit and veg! Clearly, that's not going to happen So, maybe working towards 1kg/square metre would be a good start. I think it will take a while to build up to that, but it would be fun to try.

10 portions of F&V a day!! Can you include things you've frozen or does it have to be fresh?
Have you included your GH in your growing space as you can grow a lot there.
My head is spinning with new challenges.