Farming

Food  Garden

Food is one of, if not the biggest challenge we face as a charity. To feed our staff, students, volunteers and community a huge amount of money, between £10-15000, needs to be raised each year. Even with that, we do not feed nearly enough of the people we would like to. Every day, members of our community go without food. With food prices skyrocketing, this problem is only getting bigger.  

To help offset this expense, we have launched a large-scale Farm Project on the College grounds. The project involves cultivating a substantial plot of land, focusing on enriching the soil with only natural fertilizers and ingredients to create a food garden. 

Our food garden has three objectives:

1. To grow an abundance of food to feed our staff and students, making our food budget go further. 

2. To work with nature, using regenerative farming methods

3. To provide to the local community

 

Abundance 

• Growing a wide variety of organic crops. 

• Raise chickens for eggs and meat with high welfare and life quality using the grazing/manure to improve soil structure.

• Focus on crops that go far: peppers, beans, tomatoes, cabbages, cucumbers, squashes, pumpkins

​

Working with nature

• Improve soil quality, using ‘no dig’ methods, adding large amounts of organic matter and compost to the topsoil without tilling/disturbing the soil structure. 

• Sustainable regenerative farming improves the environment, creating biodiversity and working with nature instead of against it. We will use no fertilizer or weed/pest control. 

• Encourage wildlife into our environment. Birds and fish into our ponds, animals grazing our grass and fertilising the soil.  

• Raising awareness and creating projects to combat of the negative impact of rubbish and pollution on our college and village. 

• Rainwater collecting and storing. 

• Pond renovation and improvement, potential for dry season natural water source for wildlife

• Build compost toilets in the village. Once the waste has entirely broken down, the compost can be used on the land. 

• Composted soil holds more water than compacted soil. By adding large amounts of compost during the rainy season, water retention is improved to last dry season.

 

Food for the local community 

• We aim to sell produce to the local community at heavily discounted rate so they can either consume it themselves or sell on for profit.

• We aim to donate food for the poorest members of the community 

• Community farms developed using the sustainable practices