Wisconsin Life

>> There's something I want to tell you guys that's really important. It's that Milwaukee is the greatest city in America.

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>> Will Allen may joke, but he's making Milwaukee a Mecca for urban agriculture. >> I'm from Wyoming. >> Los Angeles, California. >> Homer, Alaska. >> I come from Europe, eastern Europe, I live in Latvia. >> Okay, come on in, you guys! >> These pilgrims have traveled many miles to learn from Will and tour the Milwaukee farm he started 20 years ago. Since then, Will's become a recognized leader in the local food movement, and a recipient of the MacArthur "genius" award. But it's been a very surprising journey. >> My parents both were involved in sharecropping, and we grew up on a small farm. >> While Will grew up on a farm, more and more African Americans were leaving their agriculture roots in the rural south for jobs in northern cities. >> We didn't have a lot of spendable income, but the one powerful thing we always had was lots and lots of good food. >> Even so, Will was eager to leave the farm behind. >> When I left the farm at 18, I said never again will I do this hard work. >> As a six-foot-six teenager, he thought basketball would be his ticket out of farm life. >> I don't know if you all can reach up and grab some, but if you can...

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we'll let you take some home. So, when I went away to college, I decided to go to the University of Miami in Florida, where I was the first African-American athlete. I said that I would never go back to farming. I guess you should never say never. >> After playing pro ball in Europe, Will moved to his wife's hometown of Milwaukee. One of Will's Milwaukee jobs was managing several inner city KFC franchises. It put him in the heart of a community that didn't have access to the fresh food he grew up with. >> Coming into the city and seeing mostly fast food places and corner stores, many of the grocery stores were pulling out of these neighborhoods. So, it left a big void. We're in a food desert here. I think a lot of people from the outside, that don't live in those communities, that say get rid of all the fast food stores. If you did that, what would happen? There would be thousands of people without jobs. I don't spend a lot of my time degrading fast food places or industrial agriculture. What I want to do is give folks an opportunity for a choice. If anybody wants to try a nasturtium, just grab one and pop it your mouth. They're delicious. >> Will was surprised when he made a re-connection with his farming past. >> As soon as I touched the soil, I felt there was something missing in my life. I must have had some hidden passion for farming that just came out. And I had this strong desire to grow food again. >> Will's KFCs had served customers from Milwaukee's largest housing project. Now he sought to serve them something better, and to reconnect the largely African-American residents with an agricultural heritage that had been all but lost. >> Let's keep going. >> He bought a group of dilapidated greenhouses to create Growing Power. The small farm grows and sells fresh food in a densely populated urban center. >> We have to be able to grow more food on less space. So what we're doing here is demonstrating how you do it. That to me, is the future. As we stand here, we're losing prime farmland all over the world. So we're going to have to grow more food for more people. Figure that out, and this is one of the ways of doing that. >> And the first step is the soil. >> Any farmer will tell you, any sustainable farmer, it's all about the soil. >> All the soil you see, everywhere, we grow from waste. >> Will set up a network of food waste hauling from groceries and restaurants with businesses happy to have it taken. Even a corporate campus offers up its used coffee grounds to feed this enormous composting operation. As long as I have this stuff right here. That's the key. This is the key to scaling up urban agriculture in America. Without compost, without high quality compost, it's not going to happen. >> Will may be passionate about his compost, but saves his admiration for his worms. >> I always say I like these worms. I'll give you an idea of what they do. This is a perfect example. Inside this banana, this is what they do for food. They'll get inside that banana and they'll eat out all of this. And their waste will become the fertilizer. >> Fertilizer sold at Growing Power as Milwaukee black gold. >> And they live very harmoniously together. They're not fighting over food. They enjoy the food. So, and they don't talk to you, you know. Well, they don't talk to you. They talk to me, but they won't talk to you.

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>> Will will talk to anyone about his passion for growing or his latest project. >> In this tank right here we're going to be putting eels, so if you come back... Oh, they got me! No, there's no eels in there right now. >> His next step is this planned five story farm, retail, and education center. >> This is a very important building, as a model that we can study and figure out how these cities are going to build 50- and 100-story vertical farms. >> That may sound ambitious until you look around at all that Will Allen has built so far. And there's still a chance to join him and get in on the ground floor. >> So if any of you want to make a contribution of $12 million dollars, come and give me a check, and I'll put your name on every window and door, and whatever you want.

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I don't want a penny from you.

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You'll give me a penny!