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Somawathi Gunapala, from Pillanduwa village, in central Sri Lanka picks ripe snake beans from the vegetable garden she has established with four other community members, with Oxfam Australia’s support. Photo: Maureen Bathgate/OxfamAUS.
Environmentally friendly home gardens are helping poor families in Sri Lanka grow more food to eat and earn an income. Editor Maureen Bathgate unearths their gardening secrets.
Quintos Andesinghe walks in from the garden, his face beaded with sweat, a warm toothy smile spread across his face. In his hands, he holds a metal dish piled high with freshly-picked vegetables — purple eggplants, bright green bitter melons and long yellow snake-beans.
“We don’t buy any vegetables from the shops now,” he says. “All our vegetable needs are met right here in our garden. If we have any extra, we sell them. Our life has improved.”
Quintos is one of five community members from Pillanduwa village, near Kegalle, in central Sri Lanka, who have joined forces to establish a model home garden with the training and support of Oxfam Australia partner Development Communication Foundation.
It is part of a wider home gardening program that Oxfam Australia is supporting across Sri Lanka to reduce poor families’ day-to-day food expenses, ensure they have more food to eat and improve their nutrition levels.
Under the program, families learn how to grow traditional vegetables, fruits and herbs using environmentally-friendly gardening techniques. As well as receiving start-up seeds and plants, they are taught how to create small kitchen gardens using coconut husks, plastic sheeting, plant waste, animal manure and compost; improve soil fertility; prevent soil erosion; and make organic fertiliser and chemical-free pesticides. This training is coupled with education in better rainwater harvesting techniques, food processing and good nutrition, as well as support to build wells and access local markets so they can sell any excess produce.
Oxfam Australia trains poor families to grow vegetables using organic compost and chemical-free pesticides. Photo: Nirosh Priyanka/OxfamAUS.
So far more than 5,000 families across Sri Lanka have been involved in the home gardening program, with more than 80 per cent going on to start home gardens.
Development Communication Foundation trainer Dipika Priyadarshini says that the home gardens are placed next to the home so that kitchen waste such as rice water, vegetable scraps, waste water and cooking ash can be discarded onto it.
“These gardens don’t need too much labour — family labour can be used and with minimal expenses,” Dipika explains. “Then, when family members see the garden growing so well, everyone gets the incentive and encouragement to work on it, even the children.
“This method of home gardening is particularly good for places where there is less water or a lot of stones. It helps to make the soil more fertile.”
Group member Somawathi Gunapala says that group members divide the harvested vegetables evenly between them for home consumption and then sell any extra to make a small income.
“I take [any excess vegetables] to the market fair and sell them. We also have regular customers who come and buy them from us because it is organic, poison-free food. There is a doctor who lives in the village and he comes and buys from us here,” Somawathi says.
“Monthly we will get an income of approximately 3,000–4,000 rupees (AUD $32–$42). Then we divide it between all the group members.”
“Last week we harvested eggplants,” Quintos adds. “From that particular harvest we got about 150 rupees (AUD $1.60) each after taking some for home consumption.”
Fellow group member Piyatha Nandasena says the home gardens had improved the lives of many community members who normally relied on irregular and low-paying work as rubber-tree tappers.
“Before we had home gardens, we didn’t have that many vegetables to eat,” Piyatha says. “Now we get our vegetables from the home garden… We spend less money on food, have a large quantity of vegetables to eat and excess to sell... We are healthier.”