Plants and green spaces provide more than just aesthetic benefits

There is no place like home...however, many people who have lefttheir homeland do make their new place a reminder of their home by using plants. The Romans planted grape vines in the south of Britain soon after they arrived. Early settlers in Australia took roses with them, and started a tradition which continues today; the varieties which they took are now Australia's 'Heritage' varieties.At a 'Plants & People' conference in Cambridge in June 2014,1 a talk was given by anthropologist Virginia Nazarea which included work she had done with Vietnamese communities, mainly in Florida. In 1975, Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese, setting in motion an exodus from Vietnam to the United States. The Vietnamese have sought to continue their culture, and culinary traditions. Refugees from rural areas, in particular, brought with them their native plants, or used plants similar to what they knew in Vietnam.2 The plants included native species of taro, bitter cucumber, lemon grass, water spinach and malabar nightshade. Many of these were important as condiments in a rice-based diet and highly valued for their taste. Many Vietnamese relied on traditional healing practices, so medicinal plants were grown. Virginia Nazarea has found that the more traumatic the uprooting, the more people strive to make gardens that recreate the culture and memory of their homeland. She has found that fertilizers are avoided because it is believed that they would destroy the taste of edible crops. She has also noticed that these gardens were especially important for the elderly who often suffered from culture shock, low self-esteem and psychological disorders following migration. She refers to 'people without history'; they could rather be described as bringing their history to life though horticulture. They are also contributing to the conservation of some species: '...diverse plantings of varieties favored for home consumption on borders of commercial plots, in tangled fields of greens...and in immigrants' re-constructed landscapes'.3There is a project not far from the University of East Anglia in Norwich, a group of allotments run by the Norfolk African Community Association, which aims to sustain the African heritage. The allotments are cultivated organically and have been a focus for the Association for many years. In Swansea, the former Swansea Town FC ground, Vetch Field, was demolished a few years ago, and with Arts Project funding, part of the area has become 'Vetch Veg'.4,5 Not just an allotment site, it includes a 'shed sculpture' acting as a project resource space/library/centre for talks and performances, and a kitchen. Many different cultures have plots. For example, there are lots of people from the Bangladeshi community growing pumpkins and spinach, Thai people growing Thai onions and herbs, and Chinese elders growing pak choi and meeting for Tai Chi every morning. One allotment-holder called it her 'second home'.Without finding financial backing as an arts project, the Swansea allotments may well have failed to come to fruition. We cannot avoid being aware of cuts in local authority budgets, but enabling activity of this kind should come into the planning of towns and cities. The President of the Royal Town Planning Institute, Catherine Ranson, recently called for more integrated strategies for healthy placemaking, including providing green spaces and cooler environments. This body published a document in 2014, Promoting Healthy Cities6 and affirms the value of well-planned green space in the prevention of physical and mental illness. The report mentions that for some communities, lack of control over their environments can be a factor in ill health.Mind, the mental health charity, has for many years backed initiatives for the use of green space. In 2013, it published a report Feel Better Outside, Feel Better Inside7 calling on healthcare providers to jointly commission ecotherapy services, including gardening. …