The Ndlambe Lockdown Support Group launched project that donates vertical gardens to people with little space to grow their own.
Port Alfred, South Africa (22 October 2020) – While food gardens have been a saviour for so many, not everyone has space for a food garden. The Ndlambe Lockdown Support Group found a way around this by donating vertical gardens to people with limited space.
Ndlambe Lockdown Support Group started turning blue drums into vertical food gardens.
“The Ndlambe Lockdown Support Group has quietly been implementing our “Vegetable Garden Drum Project. The recipients of our first rollout have been the “Nemato Change A Life “Center in Nemato.
Today Lunga Mcetywa and I visited the centre to see how this has been progressing. The young people have planted and maintained these drums and it’s amazing to see how beautifully the veggies are growing. The kids taking care of these range in age from 10 to 15 so it’s really “Child’s Play” to grow some amazing and healthy vegetables.
Maintenance is very simple and with the drums requiring only around 15 litres of water a week highly efficient in a water scare area.”
The drum is also fitted with a worm farm which means the vegetables growing are getting a natural, self-applying fertilizer.
“The “Worm Farm” that self-fertilizes the drums are kept healthy from the organic waste from the area and are thriving.
We are slowly rolling out more drums in an effort to create food security within our indigent communities so that in the event of another crisis people are more self-reliant.”
The support group hope to share more of these garden drums and invite anyone who wants to get involved, to reach out. You can find donation details on their Facebook post here.
“Should you wish to purchase a Drum for your own use please mail us on ndlambelockdown19@gmail.com
Donations toward the project would be highly appreciated as we need to purchase soil, compost and most importantly more drums to continue with our rollout.
Our dream is to be able to provide every family in need a vegetable drum.”
If you would like to support a food garden in your area, you can find a list of them here.