Garden to Plate
Our Permaculture advisor Greg Knibbs, farm manager Frank Kimaro and our Green Team are always focused on improving the design, quality and volume of food grown in the gardens to create an improved, diverse, organic and healthy diet on the plates of our staff and kids.
While we often face challenges at Rainbow Ridge such as communication and connectivity (internet), water shortage (drought) or government restrictions and intervention, the team always rises to the challenge with intelligent and innovative solutions to ensure significant progress.
Our project has been boosted in recent years by the oversight of our Kenyan team from Kisumu City Permaculture Academy, collaboration with intern students from Kampala University, Uganda and the new management of Frank Kimaro so that Frank, Greg and our Green Team have ended 2023 with the delivery of our latest designed "Permaculture in Practice" week long crash course teaching African NGO representatives the best in theory and practice of sustainable farming at Rainbow Ridge
Where food is abundant and healthy so no one goes hungry or sick
In addition to teaching theory and practice of permaculture, students will learn to replicate sustainable domestic support systems operating at Rainbow Ridge including compost toilets, solar power (lights, energy, compost fans), methane gas (cooking), grey water filtration systems and solar operated water pumps.
Of course, integral to our education is animal husbandry and teaching how to build and operate appropriate pens for pigs (breeding/selling), cows, chickens and goats including free -roam area. We even have a small fish breeding operation.
our first job in transforming our site was transforming the land by creating swales (trenches) on contour to harvest water effectively.
Previously, about 86 per cent of water ran off the landscape. The annual maize crop was successfully grown despite drought-like conditions in this wet season period. Researching, sourcing and planting 2200 trees on site.
Developing vegetable gardens to capture rainwater and ensure year-round fresh and nutritious food. Sourcing a range of open pollinated vegetable and green manure seed to secure seed supply lines and to achieve better genetic diversity in the food supply.
Among the many sustainable design applications, the team learned the importance of replicating edible forest ecology where food is enough for all so no-one goes hungry.
Coupled with the “Garden to Plate” objective of growing and eating good quality food, there was much to celebrate as our overseers confirmed that our team has built a solid foundation at Rainbow Ridge to now share with the local community through a “Garden to Plate” Outreach Program.
Summary conclusions
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Rainbow Ridge demonstrates low-cost, common sense, culturally appropriate solutions for food and water security.
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Rainbow Ridge provides an effective training & demonstration site to teach sustainable solutions locally.
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The Green Team has the experience to demonstrate fast and economic ways to grow the best & most suitable foods for both home consumption, sale and/or trade surplus.
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The Green Team’s experience is now at a level sufficient to extend the “Garden Plate” Project to the wider community through a carefully designed outreach program.
The intense onsite work has proved to be the perfect recipe for teaching and preaching sustainable theory and practice from Rainbow Ridge to the local community through our new “Garden to Plate” Outreach Program starting this year.
We hold regular permaculture design courses and “permaculture in practice" courses for local and international students run by Greg Knibbs, Frank Kimaro and our Green Team.
Central to this project will be the continued transition of CA Kids to local families who will remain under the close continued care and supervision of our outreach team through in kind support and education so these families can replicate the type of healthy and sustainable living environment that exists at Rainbow Ridge.
In addition, we have partnered with a local Primary Boarding School to transform a desolate, desert site into another Rainbow Ridge while this community assists with the education/care of the remaining CA kids we continue to transition to local families over time. We are excited to train, educate and ultimately transform the horizons of another local community - school students, teachers, parents and local interested community.
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