Feed Marginalized Families Through Gardens

In June, HDI welcomed 3 new GlobeMed interns from Lawrence University. During their 6-week visit, these undergraduate students worked together with the Community of Potters to build gardens and connections.  

The communities of Masoro and Cyaruzinge are historically marginalized people who struggle with nutrition and food insecurity. When community members have to dedicate most of their income to subsistence, this prevents them from investing in other opportunities, thus keeping them trapped in a cycle of poverty. The only food they can often afford to eat is heavy in starch and low in nutrients.  

After the success of last year’s GlobeMed gardens, the communities asked this year’s visitors to help them build more gardens. Using funds from GlobalGiving, the interns were able to purchase gardening materials and seeds that the communities would not be able to afford on their own. Working alongside enthusiastic community members and HDI staff, the interns built 84 sack gardens in Masoro and 51 kitchen gardens in Cyaruzinge. Every family received at least one garden for personal consumption. These gardens promoted eating a variety of vegetables, including bell peppers, carrots, onions, and celery. 

Thanks to your support, these community members will have more options to eat nutritiously and consistently. We thank our hard working GlobeMed interns for dedicating their summer to this project and the people of Masoro and Cyaruzinge. We at HDI look forward to helping these community members continue to foster their new gardens and continuing our partnership with GlobeMed by welcoming more interns for next summer.

Last year HDI partnered with 3 students from GlobeMed to build sack gardens for Masoro Village. These gardens encouraged families to eat more vegetables in their diet and provided food security for this marginalized community. We recently interviewed community members on how these kitchen gardens are doing today. The responses were unanimous: the gardens have been a boon for the families of Masoro Village. Families told us that the gardens have allowed them to eat more healthily and consistently than they did before.

Uwiringimana told us that she and her family eat green vegetables “all of the time” now because of their sack gardens. The gardens supplement the food that they can afford to buy. Christine told us that she and her children rely upon their sack gardens for their daily food. They appreciate the security that the sacks give them, especially since they are one of the poorer families of Masoro.

The sacks have made a noteworthy improvement in the eating habits of Masoro community members, but for many of the families the sack gardens are their only or primary source of food. We want to expand access to healthy eating further so that no child in Masoro goes a day without food. Due to the success of this project (with thanks to GlobalGiving donors!), we have invited back 3 more GlobeMed volunteers this summer. They will arrive in mid-June and stay until mid-July. They will provide more sack gardens for the community of potters as well as lead healthy living trainings on nutrition, hygiene, and family planning.

We need more money to finance the materials for the gardens and trainings, such as sacks, seeds, manure, and transport. We thank our generous donors for their support for our continued development work in the community of potters.