SA Rocks

OK, so it’s all doom and gloom and the world is indeed going to Hell in a handbasket. And we won’t even be able to see it on TV because of load shedding.

So isn’t it nice when you stumble across a story so positive it warms the cockles of your heart and restores your faith in ordinary South Africans’ incredible capacity to bring about positive change? Hands up – who’s heard of Abalimi Bezekhaya? Maybe not that many. Now, hands up, who’s ever seen the Cape Town townships of Khayelitsha, Gugulathu and Nyanga? Plenty of you – in fact anybody who has ever flown into Cape Town or driven into town along the N2 freeway. On either side of the highway the tiny “RDP houses” and sad corrugated iron shacks stretch as far as the eye can see, with hardly a blade of grass of anything that passes for a pleasant recreational space to be seen. The area is beset with socio-economic problems: unemployment, gangs, drugs, rape and domestic violence.

So more doom and gloom, right?

Not entirely. You see Abalimi Bezekhaya (literally “growers of the home”) are a bunch of people who do not believe that these townships need to be a place of hopelessness. Since 1982 this non-governmental organisation has worked with disadvantaged communities and empowers them through urban agriculture and greening projects, providing training and logistical support for projects and helping to obtain resources and facilitate partnerships. They provide training programmes aimed at making sure that people can continue to replicate these projects, without the help of Abalimi, on an ongoing basis and thereby transform their environment and lives. Abalimi also produces booklets and guides on starting a garden cheaply, and have been involved in residential and school greening projects.

But what interests me most is the organic community vegetable gardens. Under Abalimi’s guidance, local groups (mostly unemployed women) have started community vegetable gardens on previously unused and barren land in the townships. They grow food for their own family on their designated plot of land, while the communal area is farmed by all, the produce is sold and the profits divided up. One of the best known of these is the Siyazama Allotment Community Garden Association, or the “powerline project”. Since 1997 The Association has been growing vegetables on a 5000sqm area under the (now decommissioned) power lines in Macassar, Khayelitsha. The association consists of 15 farmers at present, meaning that 15 families (or about 90 people) depend on the produce grown there. The methods are all organic and indigenous vegetation is used in the windbreaks. Any surplus not destined for the gardeners’ tables is sold locally, or in Cape Town where the demand for organic vegetables is huge. The scheme has been such a success that plans are currently afoot to fence an adjacent three hectares of sandy wasteland to expand the project and include another 200-300 gardeners.

If you are interested, here is an interview with Sindiswa Mahuza, one of the gardeners. And if you want to assist Abalimi in their outstanding work, you can donate here.

And if that story doesn’t put you in a good mood for the weekend, nothing will!

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