MEDIA RELEASE:
WesBank Fund empowers community members with knowledge and skills to plant own home food gardens
On Friday 21 May, more than 300 NGO’s, members from various Hospices, church groups and the greater community of WhiteCity gathered at the African Children’s Feeding Scheme Centre in Jabavu, Soweto for the inaugural “A re Lemeng – lets get planting” workshop, a WesBank Fund initiative, supported by Tshikululu Social Investments.
The WesBank Fund operates under the umbrella of the FirstRand Foundation and supports nine community agricultural organisations across South-Africa. All the organisations have a track record of service delivery and are regarded as best practice models in the sector.
As part of ongoing learning in the sector, the “A re Lemeng” workshop was developed to empower individuals and communities with the knowledge and skills to plant and maintain their own home or community food garden, helping to create food security and sustainable livelihoods at the micro level. The knowledge and skills delivered at the workshops are based on best practices identified from the beneficiaries of the WesBank Fund.
“Creating and ensuring sustainable food security at the micro community level is a key focus area for the WesBank Fund, “says Dr George Nyabadza, Chairman of the WesBank Fund.
The WesBank Fund believes that the need to empower communities to become self-supporting is one of the most pressing needs in South Africa. Only in breaking the cycle of poverty and dependence can people regain their dignity and catch a glimpse of a brighter future. In order to develop sustainable progress, it is critical to influence people's thinking - moving them beyond the victim mentality and empowering them to take responsibility for their own development.
The workshop began at 09:00 and concluded at 15:00. Groups of 20-25 participants were segmented to allow a rotation of the learning sessions. The learning sessions commenced with a formal “school type” lecture on crop rotation and harvesting presented by Lynette Parsons from LIMA. This was followed by hands-on teaching on creating food towers and other planting techniques, ground trenching, compost formation, pest control and growing of organic matter.
The workshop included exhibitions stands, questions and answer sessions, community engagement, actual digging and trench making and handing out of brochures and seed packs sponsored by Mayford. The exhibition stands included; The Department of Agriculture, Food Gardens Foundation, Hlumelisa, Ilima Development and Robin Good.
The African Children Feeding Scheme (ACFS), a WesBank Fund beneficiary, hosted the day at their feeding centre in Jabavu. ACFS currently feeds 21 000 children daily and 130 families are benefiting from its food gardens programme.
The “A re Lemeng – let’s get planting” workshop will be rolled out to various communities across South Africa during the next 12 months.
WesBank is a division of FirstRand Bank Limited.Authorised Financial Services and Credit Providers (NCRCP20).
Media Enquiries:
Fleishman-Hillard WesBank
Genea Frade Loura Brown
011 548 2002 011 649 5298
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