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Nepal: Homegrown tastes best in Kathmandu |
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Urgent issues
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Manish’s potplant garden has grown to take up every inch of outdoor space in his home.
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Pratigya R. Khaling, Communications Associate, World Vision Nepal
Sushila won’t forget the day her son came home and asked her for flowerpots.
“I wondered what this little chap was up to,” she recalls.
Sushila’s son Manish, 12, a sponsored child living in Kathmandu, had come home from a Children’s Club meeting where he had learned about a new way of growing vegetables called Zero Land Farming.
“He was all excited,” says Sushila. “He had seedlings of brinjal, green chilly and beans. Even though I had my own doubts, I let him do what he wanted to and what he had learnt. He planted those seeds in the flowerpots I gave him.”
Manish was keen to pass the technique on to his mother. “First they taught us how to dig the soil and manage it in the flowerpot,” he remembers. “Then we learnt how to plant the seeds into it and it was so fascinating for me. I could not wait to go home and show it to my mother. But I wondered whether these plants would actually grow or not. However, as instructed, I started taking care of them and watering them everyday.”
Manish’s mother, impressed with his dedication, also started learning and helping him with the watering of the plants. Then to their surprise, the seedlings took off.
In six weeks time, small brinjal started to sprout. It was same with the beans and green chilly. The sight of little brinjal and beans brought a proud smile to Manish’s face.
But these little plants are more than a fun hobby. In overcrowded Kathmandu, jobs are hard to find and land to farm is scarce. Families like Manish’s, living in poor slum neighbourhoods, often have a hard time making ends meet.
Sushila’s husband’s small salary supports his two children plus his own parents. Sushila tries to help by running a small shop, but it makes hardly any money at all.
After three months of planting these vegetables, Manish’s family had their first meal of their home produced brinjal. Sushila says, “When I cooked it for the first time, I was not quite sure of it. However, every one in my family loved the taste. They said it tasted better than the market ones. This brought happiness and joy inside me. And I felt mostly proud of my little boy that he was the one to learnt to do it. Even Manish ate so much that day.”
This encouraged both the mother and the son to produce more vegetables like this. The training continued, through World Vision’s partnership with the Institute of Integrated Development and Research. After the completion of every training, children are given free seedlings of seasonal vegetables. Every Saturday, Manish would attend, then come back and teach his mother everything.
They started planting vegetables like tomatoes, cucumbers, ladies fingers and even pumpkins in flowerpots. Soon every sunny spot they could find was full of vegetable flowerpots. The outcome of their dedication and hard work is that they are now able to give the home produced vegetables to their relatives and their neighbors. After eating them, the relatives always give credit to clever, industrious Manish.
Sushila says, “ This is like my new found passion. I am a housewife and I run this small grocery shop. I hardly spend time in the shop these days because I am busy attending my vegetables only.”
Sushila says, “I feel proud that my little boy taught me this process. This zero land farming is a very good way of producing vegetables. Vegetable prices have gone up so much in the market. We hardly can afford it. However my son’s association with World Vision has gotten us free seedlings; we grow our own vegetables at home. A little money is being saved and the vegetables are nutritious as well.”
Manish says, “If we keep working so hard at this, then that day will also come when we no longer have to buy vegetables from the market at all.”
Not only Manish’s family, but 50 other families of Kathmandu ADP have benefited from Zero Land Farming. Lokendra Shrestha, World Vision’s Community Development Facilitator in Kathmandu, says “Zero Land farming is a very fast and affordable technique of growing vegetables at home only. The trainings are very simple starting from nursery development to harvesting on seasonal vegetables, which is very easy for young children and uneducated mothers to understand and follow.”
Seeing all the good works of World Vision, Manish’s mother Sushila says, “ I just wish that World Vision keeps coming up with these kind of programs which increase our knowledge. Not only our children but also uneducated mothers like me, we learn a lot.”
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