Oasis Citadine

Oasis Citadine, based in Montpellier, has been offering an innovative model of a collaborative urban farm since April 2018, following agroecological practices and the ethics of permaculture. Located on an 8000 m2 plot made available by the Château de Flaugergues, its primary goal is to allow city dwellers to reconnect with nature in a fun and friendly environment.

We currently have 250 members and 80 active members who actively participate in the co-creation of this place. We cater to both an adult audience (training and workshops in agroecology and permaculture) and a young audience (welcoming school groups to the farm, creating vegetable gardens in schools).

Our action in environmental education and awareness is one of the primary missions of the association. As part of this mission, we invite our members to participate in creating a refuge for biodiversity in the city. Since 2018, we have designed our farm with this in mind: setting up a forest garden, creating ponds in the heart of the 4 vegetable gardens, installing several biodiversity hives (known as warré hives), or planting nearly 500 trees as part of an agroforestry project.

Project Description

In line with the projects carried out within our Oasis to raise awareness about preserving biodiversity in urban areas, this year we have focused our action around three main axes:

- Creating grassy and flowered strips that will provide several services to our ecosystem. In a permaculture system, we aim to design and maintain living, sustainable, and resilient ecosystems. In this sense, grassy and flowered strips are key elements as they limit soil erosion (slowing down water runoff, improving infiltration), promote soil life, constitute corridors for surrounding fauna, and create a conducive environment for pollinating insects and garden auxiliaries. The grassy and flowered strips will be multiplied within our farm.

- Building an aromatic spiral, which is a combination of plants with different needs, made possible by a relief layout. This permaculture concept demonstrates how, in a minimum of space, several permaculture design principles can be applied and how beneficial plants for the garden and humans (edible, medicinal, and honey plants) can coexist. This aromatic spiral will be located in our forest garden, near the hives.

- Purchasing peasant and organic seeds to cultivate a diversity of plant varieties no longer found in commerce. The advantage of peasant seeds is their genetic diversity, which ensures more resilience and better adaptation to climate changes. By buying peasant and organic seeds, we wish to multiply, within our educational farm, ancient varieties that have disappeared.