Growing Children and Organic Food in the Heart of Africa
With the help of an Australian partner, Sylvestre Nzitukuze has built a small living lab of sustainable agriculture and husbandry for the vulnerable children who live at El Shaddai Orphanage in Rwanda’s capital, Kigali.
El Shaddai has about 150 children living at the center, with another 50 attending secondary and vocational schools. The residents are primarily survivors of the 1994 genocide and the AIDS pandemic, which have taken their toll on the country and its people. The youth are served 2 meals a day, attend school and sleep 4-6 per bunk bed, depending on their age and size. They also receive spiritual guidance and support from a local religious organization (C.A.L.P.E.R.S.) that holds church services at the abandoned auto garage now used for the center.
Sylvestre, who is the activity and sport director at El Shaddai and brought many of its residents off the streets of Kigali, wanted to supplement the children’s diet and raise enough food to be able to sell and raise funds for the center. With the experience of his 2 years of training in gardening and husbandry practices, which he obtained in secondary school (high school), Mr. Nzitukuze began planting seeds with the children in the barren, rocky (but fertile) soil behind the orphanage. As he slowly received funds for wood and wire, he started building raised hutches, cages and enclosures. Damming and redirecting the small trickle of a stream that ran through the backyard, he created 2 fishponds and stocked them with catfish and Talapia.
The red volcanic soil that covers Rwanda is rich in iron and minerals. 80% of the population are farmers and every square inch of available land on every hillside and valley is utilized. There are approximately 3 growing seasons, each lasting about 3 months long, for a total of 9 months during which one can plant and harvest. Abundant rainfall for three-fourths of the year makes it unnecessary to have much irrigation, though the children at El Shaddai are taught how to sprinkle water individually onto each plant with bunched straw in the dry season or when an unexpectedly long dry spell has occurred.
Using all organic products, Sylvestre and the children have successfully grown a diverse crop of spinach, corn, tomatoes, rhubarb, bell pepper, eggplant, and papaya trees. Interspersed between abandoned auto parts, the playground, warehouse and bathrooms, the intermixed vegetables thrive (minus the ones eaten by the roaming chickens).
Starting out with 20 rabbits, a few chickens, geese and turkeys, El Shaddai now has over 80 rabbits, pigeons, guinea pigs and ever-increasing families of chicks and geese. Eggs and thus protein are steadily being introduced into the children’s diet. Rabbit droppings are used for fertilizer in the garden and for fish food in the ponds. “Meat is very expensive here,” says Sylvestre, “but because of the rabbits and chickens we are lucky.”
They have not been able to raise enough vegetables, eggs or meat to start selling for profit, but with a little more materials, to keep some of the animals apart from one another and away from the garden, the project should soon produce enough quantities for both the orphanage and for them to sell to the local community. It’s not a big production, says Sylvestre, but we’ve used what we have and are showing the children what is possible when you integrate living systems, education and hard work.
Gabriel Constans has written for numerous publications in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa. His work can be seen online at www.gogabriel.com/articles