Lisa Isaacs
IN AN effort to help small-scale farmers utilise their land efficiently, cut overhead costs and rehabilitate the soil, the Philippi Horticultural Area’s (PHA) Food and Farming campaign has started a project to teach local farmers how to survive.
Using two hectares of land within the PHA, the Small Scale Farming Model initiative employs sustainable farming methods using less land, less water and no chemical inputs, said PHA spokesperson Nazeer Sonday.
The successes will be shared with local farmers, land reform beneficiaries, and those who want to grow food will benefit through workshops which will begin in January.
Susanna Coleman, Campaign member, said that local farmers who use commercial farming techniques to manage their small-scale farms are often forced to sell their land, and lose their business as it is too expensive to use commercial techniques on smaller pieces of land.
The project also aims to develop a direct-sale farmers’ market, protect the environment, counter carbon emissions and promote biodiversity.
At the weekend, 100 people who live close to the land, along with farmers and farm workers, planted fynbos around the site.
The fynbos acts as an integrated pest management system as it attracts beneficial insects which will eat the ones which are harmful for the crops. Some of these insects will also act as natural pollinators, Sonday said.
The next step will be to plant cover crops, he added.
“This is our compost, natural fertilisers and soil amendments to build good soil structure and attract the beneficial soil food web. This way, we are developing the nutrient supply for the food crops to come later,” Sonday added.
Up to 100 different fruits, vegetables, nuts, herbs and flowers will be planted and looked after by volunteers.
Sonday said the project also aimed to protect the PHA by using the land for farming, instead of it being purchased by land developers.
“We want to practice better soil management in a small-farm model. Seventy percent of the world’s food is produced by small farmers on an average of 2ha.
“Large-scale commercial farming and genetically modified organism technologies have not solved the problem of world hunger, but in South Africa and elsewhere in the developing world contributes to wholesale migration of people to the city slums.
“We want to test how much income we can generate from a 2ha production model using low-technology and little money.”
Sonday said the initiative would also aid the City’s climate-change targets for mitigation and adoption measures because building soil carbon as a good soil management practice sequestrates excess CO2 from the atmosphere.
“Our model is to inspire, and become a centre of learning and information dissemination.
“Those who have land need to use it more creatively and stop being the victim of opportunists like dumpers or commercial farming methods, which all degrade our land and are not productive at all on a small scale,” Coleman said.