With the mantra “food and eating unite us all,” three recent business school graduates decided to do some civic uniting of their own through gardening. The result is a business called Young Urban Farmers, founded by Nancy Huynh, Chris Wong and Jing Loh in spring 2009.

The idea includes “sharing our passion for local organic produce by making gardening simple, fun and rewarding for people across the GTA, Ontario and beyond,” their website says.

Their method is to do as much or as little as the client wants. A full-service option includes planting, maintenance and harvesting. Customers who want to dig in themselves can choose consultations about what fruits and vegetables will grow best in their garden or on their condo balcony.

Every interested homeowner, with or without a big backyard, is given a growing guide with tips and advice on starting, thinning, watering, pruning and harvesting their own produce, from strawberries to shiitake mushrooms.

“The first year, a lot of our clients wanted the full-service option. This year though, three quarters of our clients are into doing most of the work themselves once we set them up,” Loh says.

“I guess that’s because gardening information and the whole 100-Mile Diet is in the media a lot more. People are getting into it and that’s good to see.”

With the locavore buzz continuouslly getting louder, the three savvy Queen’s University alumni saw a need to “promote local, organic produce and a healthy lifestyle.”

Wong adds, “We felt that there was a huge underserved need and demand from Torontonians for fresh, delicious, backyard-grown produce. People want to get started in backyard vegetable growing, but don't always know where or how to start.”

The Young Urban Farmers stress that they follow organic gardening principles and do not use any chemical pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, genetically modified seeds or transplants. With all the current news about salmonella-tainted green onions and American eggs, the timing is ripe for do-it-yourselfers who want healthy, edible rewards for their efforts.

The three partners grew up helping their parents tend backyard fruit and vegetable patches; Wong’s aunt Debbie, their mentor, runs a commercial farm near Newmarket. They consulted with more experienced gardeners, read up on the subject, and designed packages to suit urban-dwellers who long for their own patch of edibles. Both in-ground planting and raised garden beds are offered.

Clients range from busy professionals and families with small children to those who simply don’t want to “do the heavy lifting and hard work of setting up a garden,” Wong says.

One such client is Dave Eason, a professional with a young family living near Avenue Rd. and Lawrence Ave. W. He and his wife decided that it would be a good idea for their children “to understand how some of the produce that we eat actually grows.”

Eason admits he’s not a green thumb — “Grey is more like it.”

Having the Young Urban Farmers set him up with a backyard raised garden including follow-up calls, emails, newsletters and on-site visits was just what his family needed to get started, he says.

“This is a really good initiative. What could be more local than food from your own backyard? It makes sense and I prefer it to importing produce from another hemisphere if I don’t have to,” Eason says.

This summer he has successfully been harvesting the fruits of his own labour, mostly salad greens, cucumbers, tomatoes and herbs.

To Wong and his colleagues, Young Urban Farmers isn’t just a viable business. More crucially, it represents people’s ability to have access to a sustainable food source.

“It is really the synergy that comes from taking the perspective of food as an all-encompassing topic that addresses everything from health to social security to economic development to cultural celebrations,” he says.

Wong cites Cultivating Food Connections, the strategy report recently adopted by Toronto Public Health, and admits he’s “really excited” about its push for leadership on health and food issues.

“It can help make Toronto a more food-secure place,” he says.

If the Young Urban Farmers have anything to do with it, they’ll be part of making that happen.