Economic gardening has evolved as an economic development strategy over the past decade. The idea arose in the 1980s from the confluence of two thoughts. One was the possibility that many businesses and the people working in them would not find a new location attractive for a variety of reasons. Second, most communities have unique skills and knowledge that can underpin marketable products and services if they are nurtured in the right way.
As a result, the business recruitment strategy (or ‘economic hunting’) was challenged by one based on nurturing local businesses and talents (‘economic gardening’). This evolution of thinking about economic development parallels that of our society from ‘hunting and gathering’ to the structure we know today where many identify with their location.
In economic program terms, economic gardening began in 1989 under the guidance of Chris Gibbons, the director of economic development for the City of Littleton, Colorado. Chris remains at the leading edge of refining the approach, and has been joined by a collegiate army of economic gardeners.
Research at the USA Centre for the New West supported the early development of the economic gardening strategy. The idea was introduced to Australia by Phil Burgess, then Director of the Centre for the New West. His 1995 visit was coordinated by the ANZ Section of the Regional Science Association. His theme was ‘building high performance communities’ with economic gardening being a critical element.
Burgess spoke of categories of businesses and focused on the small businesses where most of the jobs growth occurred. He referred to (p11-12):
While the economic gardening program can assist all businesses to run better, a strategy to seek economic growth will focus on the swashbucklers and explorers, the gazelle or would-be gazelle businesses.
Economic gardening is a widely-used term with a Google search now turning up about 900,000 entries. That is symbolic of the momentum that has been built up around an alternate strategy to regional development.
A decade has passed since Burgess‘s visit to Australia. Economic Gardeners is the necessary bringing together of knowledge, information and technology to support the widespread use of economic gardening throughout regional Australia. That action at the local level will be the catalyst to bring forth additional resources from government and corporations to sustain and enhance a new era in regional development.
