'Food gardeners help feed the city'

GEORGE NEWS - "Thanks to each one of you for helping to feed the people in our city."

This was the message of Carli Bunding-Venter, head of local economic development at the George Municipality, during the Kos en Fynbos summer food garden festival.

The municipality sponsored gifts and prizes for the festival that were handed out at functions held in the various wards that took part. More than 300 gardens were entered for the festival. "Kos en Fynbos is about you, the gardeners. You should spread the message of food gardening and share what you learn in your community," said

Bunding-Venter.

Mayor Charles Standers, who attended the Touwsranten function, expressed the hope that everyone will remain motivated and continue with their food gardens. He said one of the successes of the movement is the difference that is being made in people's lives by the passionate Kos en Fynbos coordinators.

"The project is getting communities to get to know one another again, to work together and to share. Everywhere we hear of people growing too much vegetables for their own usage and how they hand out the excess. Seedlings, seed and compost are also shared."

He referred to the Worker Collection Point, another initiative that works towards the same goal as Kos en Fynbos.

Here a gardening project has been established as a free service where the community is taught to help themselves.

"People are also shown to make compost and hundreds of seedlings have been handed out to the community."

For the first time, gardens from Thembalethu were entered for a Kos en Fynbos festival. This was the third year that a summer food garden festival was held. The movement started from among the Blanco community three years ago and has since been bringing together, encouraging and supporting people who use their gardens productively to put food on the table. It has since spread through various wards in the city and has proven so successful that the George Municipality has become one of the main supporters of the movement.

Prizes and gifts

In each ward, three main prizes consisting of a wheelbarrow, seed and a number of gardening implements were handed over. Gift packs of seeds and implements were also handed out to the other participants.

Click here for a photo gallery.

The winners were:

Thembalethu
Nomatizi Virginia Nyobole - Best Garden
Pumza Kumalo - Best Compost

Mgcineleli Jackson Noda - Most Creative Garden

Rosemoor
Annie Windvoël - Best Garden
Alfred Buys - Second Best Garden

John Gerald Lawrence - Best Compost

Lavalia
Grezelda Pietersen - Best Garden
Cornelius Veldman - Second Best

Joe Bobanie - Third Best

Hoekwil
Jeffrey Jansen - Best Garden
Sharon Fisher Buys - Most Creative Garden

Cedrick Buys (Seven Passes Initiative) - Best Compost

New Dawn Park
Katrina Fortuin - Best Garden
Maria Williams - Second Best

Francois Titus - Third Best