Utete, TZ – School students help family build a garden – 2 Aug 2013

AMN and students working hard to prepare the garden.

Students from Parmiter’s school in UK helped AMN build her vegetable garden of raised beds with compost and rice hull charcoal mixed into the soil, and plant tomatoes, carrots, chilies, sweet peppers, okra, mung beans, beans, and eggplant

AMN is an enthusiastic woman!  She is also an experienced farmer.  So much so that some of the locals call her bibi shamba, which means agriculture specialist in Swahili.  Once qualified for the garden, AMN was one of the first mamas to have her land tilled and her fence built (two ways that families show their commitment to the gardens).  AMN was anxious to try and grow vegetables that she had not been able to before without compost or fertilizer.

AMN and students in newly planted garden