Guess what?! Just a few days ago Wesley was leading the first PAF Workshop on Sack Gardening. Five headmen of the area welcomed this workshop to be held by us. We don’t really have facilities at PAF Center yet to host events such as workshops. So our PAF members and their kids gathered underneath a tree where Wesley was preparing a blackboard with all necessary information.
Teaching a workshop was a first for Wesley as well. But his motivation to transfer knowledge to the villagers and the next generation made him a great teacher. And the audience has not only been our PAF ladies, but also young men and kids who are interestend in learning about securing their food supply.
Ever heard of sack gardening? No? Keep on reading then.
As the world grapples with the garbage scourge and does not know what to do with it, we at PAF have a solution:
You guys have probably seen banana stems after you cut them, right? Where do those go?
We at PAF use them as base for growing veggies. I mean…who would wanna waste all that moisture, nutrients and perfect temperature in the stem?
Now you wonder what happens to the used maize and fertiliser sacks?
Sack gardening basically means to turn your unwanted sacks into a veggie garden for your kitchen. Yes…that is right. We are using the banana stems and old sacks to plat veggies in them. Only little water is needed because the sack holds moisture for a long time, even in the scorching Zambian sun. Lets say 5 litres of water can last for close to a week. The soil never leaches the manure from it.
The sacks can be used up to six months, which means you are set for two times of harvest. Then due to the watering and nutrients in the soil the sacks decompose and basically turns into soil as well. Also we reduce the garbage because there is no sack littering.
Additionally to Sack Gardening the participants also learned more about Kitchen Gardening and the usage of old plastic buckets and trenches as pots to grow veggies in small scale for kitchen use.
The wokshop contained both, a theoretical and practical part. First the knowledge was transfered and people could take notes and ask questions. And then they learned how to prepare the banana stems, the sacks, the trenches and of course the plastic bucets filled with trench material.
So what do you think? Did we find a good solution? We are quite happy. Since the workshop was well appreciated and a success we are planning on extending the offer of workshops at PAF Center. We are toying with, hopeflly, being able to hold workshops more regularly in the future.
If you have any suggestion for topics you consider helpful concerning farming, irrigation and fighting drought, please let us know! Thank you 🙂
