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When Cuban teacher Maria Felix Bonome started cultivating the front yard of her home in the Havana suburb of Cojimar, it was quite a revolutionary thing to do. Before 1989, half of Cuba's caloric intake was imported from the Eastern bloc, and the rest of its food came from the countryside. No one planted fruits or vegetables in the city.

But then the Soviet Union collapsed, and dire food shortages hit its Caribbean trading partner. While some Cubans panicked, Bonome created a cooperative urban garden, an organipÛnico.

Soon, the citizens of Havana began cultivating any available plot of land--including rooftops and balconies. City authorities opened an urban agriculture department to support the growers by providing them with seeds, technical advice, and free land titles for cultivation only. They instituted a seed house network and outlawed chemical fertilizers and pesticides.