Namibia

The other reason I was a bit delinquent in blogging last week was the morning after John left I flew to Windhoek, Namibia. This was my second trip to Namibia. John, Kevin Winge and I went there in November of 2006 to check out a food programme called Hope Initiatives. HI was started by Patricia Sola, a woman from Zimbabwe who had received her masters degree in psychology from the UK. Patricia had been working with children in refugee camps in Zambia and came to Windhoek to visit her sister who was very ill. When she saw what was happening or actually not happening, she decided to stay and be with her sister and do something for the children in the townships. Thus, Hope Initiatives began. We were impressed with the programme and with Patricia and her husband John. Open Arms belongs to a national organization based in Washington DC called ANSA. ANSA stands for Association of Nutrition Services Agencies. Open Arms was the first agency to sponsor a food programme in Africa. Two years ago ANSA developed its own International Programme based on the relationship between Open Arms and the JL Zwane Centre. Hope Initiatives was the first programme to be adopted by ANSA and a few of its member agencies. I was invited by Mary Reed, who developed the ANSA International Programme, to come and participate in learning about two different garden programmes. A traditional organic in-ground garden and a low-maintenance container box garden.

Hope Initiatives had recently completed their new building in a settlement area called Kilimanjaro. Previous to this they were serving meals out of a centre in a nearby settlement which was farther for the children to walk to. Their new property is big enough to have a soccer field and a garden area! The idea was to supplement the food programme with fresh fruit and vegetables that would be harvested from the gardens and also sold at the local markets to generate income for the programme.

The in-ground gardens were designed and implemented by Doug Gosling from Food for Thought (also a member agency of ANSA) in Sonoma County and Steve Bolinger from Development in Gardening (DIG), a non-profit working in Senegal and Uganda. (Note of interest: Laura and Jenna Bush visited Steve and DIG in Senegal) Jonathan Norton from Operation Lionheart from Johannesburg, South Africa, educated us on the container box garden which is called the Earthbox. The Earthbox is made up of a plastic box that has a lifetime warranty. The soil is shredded coconut, shelf life of 4 years, fertilizer, which you replace once a year and a cover that has a dark side for winter and a light side for summer. You can plant either seedlings or seeds in the container box which takes about 5 weeks to become full grown plants. The amazing thing about the Earthbox is you don't need land space, it takes less water and less time to have full grown fruits and vegetables. I think this is the perfect thing to introduce to the JL Zwane Centre due to the issue of land space and water. This would also be invaluable for individual families in the townships. Jonathan is working with schools and HIV/AIDS programs in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town. Their goal is to be everywhere on the African continent. This program has been available in the US for a while now. Jonathan's company bought the rights to market the product in Africa. The cost of the Earthbox is between R295 and R395 (about $30 to $40) depending on quantity. I now know what my next fund raising project will be!

I digress, back to the gardens. The idea for Hope Initiatives was to incorporate both types of gardens to be able to enhance the feeding programme and to use the gardens as an educational programme for the community.

The land is extremely rocky and it took many hands to clear the garden and dig the patches for preparation of the garden. But in one week there were 14 in-ground plots and enough room for 122 Earthboxes that will be shipped in two weeks to Kilimanjaro. I must say, it was an incredible experience for me to actually be a part of a hands-on project like this. As you can see from the pictures, a lot was accomplished in one week and the smiles on the faces of all involved show how proud they are of all the hard work they did to bring their community together.

Picture #1: View from the garden area of the new Hope Initiatives building.
Picture #2: Patricia and John, can you guess what well known painting they are trying to replicate?
Picture #3: The children enjoying their meal.
Picture #4: The organic garden space.
Picture #5: Jonathan explaining how to create the Earthbox.

Bye for now...