Achievements (inactive)
Achievements/Outcomes
Soil for Life’s Training and Resource Centre serves a dual purpose – as the organisation’s administrative centre and as a model of sustainability. It is run as a Food Gardening Enterprise and has been used as a model for similar initiatives in the communities in which the organisation works.
The centre generates income through sales of vegetables, seeds, seedlings and plants, earthworms and earthworm products, compost and preserves, training courses and workshops and memberships. It provides employment for community members and is offering learnerships to community members who are already part of the home gardening initiative and who want to explore other opportunities in the field of urban agriculture.
FGE’s in the communities have the same opportunities available to them. Since the Home Gardening programme is growing rapidly, there in enormous potential for job creation and income generation.
Photo – Levana Growers and Sinebhonga and Good Hope Garden
Home Gardens – ‘small patches of salvation’
‘Small is beautiful and bountiful (and manageable, and sustainable).’
In 2009/10 Soil for Life provided a training and support programme to community and home garden groups in Langa, Gugulethu, KTC, Nyanga, Samora, Phillipi, Lavender Hill, Seawinds, Vrygrond, Hillview, Overcome Heights, China Town and surrounds.
320 new home gardens were set up directly benefitting 320 people, plus another 1920 dependants and community members. In addition, 169 home gardeners from 2008 were monitored and supported through visits and the ‘While our Gardens Grow…’ programme.
Composting in Lavender Hill plus, plus, plus
People are growing…
People are eating…
People are selling…
People are getting to know each other …
A small team from Soil for Life is visiting towns and villages in the Cape and showing people how to bury their rubbish to enrich their plots of ground, how to fashion effective gardening aids from bits and pieces lying around, safe commonsense ways to control pests – and, in a couple of months, to put fresh, pesticide-free vegetables on the table all year round.
Exercise, open air, good food and reduction of stress all help in the fight against AIDS and poverty-related diseases. The food garden as a classroom stimulates original thinking and creativity. For these novice gardeners it’s a new chance in life and they can’t get enough of it.
People are healthier, happier, saving money, making friends, learning skills, sharing what they have and moving ahead with their lives. They’re proud of what they’re doing, and they’re making a worthwhile contribution to their neighbourhood, especially because they have turned barren wasteland into little green oases.
