This wall is alive, living and feeding hungry Londoners

There’s a new wall in downtown London, Ont. and it’s alive.

Pillar Nonprofit Network has teamed up with the London Food Bank to install a living wall where they are growing fresh vegetables and herbs.

“Our plan is to provide the vegetables and herbs to local agencies in the downtown area that are providing food to the less fortunate people of London,” Maureen Cassidy, interim CEO of Pillar Nonprofit Network said.

She added, “The point of the living wall is to help with some of the problems that are happening here in the core, and we know that people are hungry and we know there are a number of agencies that are feeding people in the core so we want to be a part of that.”

Glen Pearson of the London Food bank told CTV News London, “The living walls were provided by Business Cares, and Pillar Non Profit contacted us and said ‘Could you help us set up a green wall’ but in discussion with them we talked about how about sharing the food from that with feeding agencies around the downtown area, and they jumped right on that — they loved the idea."

The walls are three foot by three foot squares, and depending on the size, it takes two to three days from start to finish. Everything is provided by the London Food bank, and all the business has to provide is the wall space.

When Pearson was asked why should people get involved he replied, “I just found out Wednesday night that we are now helping 5,000 families a month, we’ve never have been close to any of that before and I think people have been hearing about that in food banks across the country so we all know this is a way to grow sustainable food supplies but also as fresh as it can get.”

If your business or school has an empty wall and would like to participate you can contact Maureen Cassidy at Pillar Nonprofit Network or the London Food Bank.

“I can’t see a reason why not to do it,” Cassidy said. “It’s easy, It’s self contained, it’s self sustaining, it runs by itself and you're doing a good thing for the community and they need it right now.”