Healing Garden SA initiative is a great platform to get your hands dirty in the soil and receive free therapeutic experience. Started in 2019 by Nomonde Gubevu and her seven year old daughter Kgolukile Gubevu, are firm believers of community building and preserving the environment for the next generation to come, the initiative is based in Soweto and they are targeting 11 schools who will be benefiting from this exciting initiative.
Healing Garden SA will include affirmation messages and notes from the individuals who contributed to building the gardens, these notes will be in different places of the garden which kids will find and read. “What we love about the messages that will be attached to the plants is that they will be written in mother tongue and it will make it a more pleasant experience for the kids. For these gardens we are collecting seeds and plants from anyone who would like to donate towards the initiative. We are encouraging the community, more especially parents who are directly affected by the state of the schools to participate on planting days in each school,” said Nomonde.
The initiative welcomes community members to bring gardening equipment to assist clean and prepare the spaces for gardening. Healing Garden SA is divided into three phases including, authorisation where partners associated with the initiative including Paper Management founded by Nomonde, Kool Kids Dream Big and Active Store Supply Group to name a few are at the fore front of the initiative and all these companies are black youth owned businesses. Phase two includes nutrition programme, where each school will have a vegetable garden which the school will be encouraged to use to feed the children.
The final phase will assist leaners in high school to make an informed decision regarding their career of choice, Healing Garden SA together with their partners will be mentoring scholars in the participating high schools on their career journey. This means learners will be provided with workshops and learning material with lessons and activities that will encourage the learners to dream big and succeed in their respective careers. “We will be having our first launch and planting our first garden in Megatong Primary School in Mapetla, Soweto and it will be on 7th November. We invite everyone to join us and make a difference in our townships, we are highly affected by dumping sites and health hazards therefore people should take this as an opportunity to correct that and create an environment that would be conducive for our children,” added Gubevu.
