PLANTING THE SEEDS OF FUTURE GROWTH

PLANTING THE SEEDS OF FUTURE GROWTH - A FOOD SECURITY INITIATIVE

Amathole Forestry Company’s (AFC) Stakeholder Relations Department has embarked on a food security programme to assist communities neighbouring the AFC plantations. 

The first step was to identify the 100% black, women-owned nursery (Khanya Nursery) based in Alice and sign an Enterprise Development Agreement. Khanya Nursery, like many small businesses in the country, has been struggling to make ends meet due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Cash flow has also been affected. Business for the nursery dried up during the winter months as local food-garden growers, the nursery’s target market, couldn’t plant during the dry season. AFC donated four tonnes of growing medium which breathed new life into the main business of growing and selling seedlings. 

AFC also signed a Supplier Development Agreement to purchase 13 000 seedlings from the nursery this financial year for the AFC’s food security programme. This initiative is aimed at improving nutrition in the surrounding 86 communities communicated to via eight liaison structures. Each structure nominates beneficiaries of seedlings - spinach, onion, beetroot and cabbage, for household food gardens. It is envisaged that small businesses will graduate from within the 216 households who benefit from this initiative.

AFC further appointed the nursery to train ten unemployed youth from Upper Tyume Villages (Khayalethu, Hala and Nothenga). The week-long training programme covers soil preparation, soil and plant nurturing and disease and pest control. On completion of the training, all participants received seedlings.