Youth action: saving our soils 6

© Think Globally Eat Locally

Victoria Rogers and Michael Stevenson, Northern Ireland
Think Globally, Eat Locally, Volvo Adventure 2011 2nd prize winner

Our project, Think Globally, Eat Locally, at East Belfast’s Grosvenor Grammar School, encourages people to lower their carbon footprint by growing our own vegetables. Inspired by our biology teachers, we decided to establish an active vegetable garden to grow produce for school departments, like science and home economics, and to supply our canteen with local, in-season ingredients.

As part of an earlier waste reduction initiative, we’d already been making our own vermiculture compost from organic waste generated at school, collecting it from small green bins in the staff room and in the home economics classroom. Using this com-post, we’d grown some vegetables for our biology labs – including giant pak choi to feed our lizard! Then two things fell into place. First, our new school site was under construction nearby, making it easy to request space for a proper garden. The builders even helped us set up the 12 raised beds we needed, made of recycled plastic. Second, we’d won £500 (about $800) in another environmental competition, which funded the purchase of soil and seeds.

We decided to plant vegetables such as carrots, potatoes, onions, beetroot and spinach that would be harvestable before the summer holidays begin, as well as herbs. The canteen staff are particularly keen to try new recipes when using our produce. Teachers ask about the herbs and how to grow certain vegetables, while pupils ask how to cook certain foods. The garden brings the community together.

Next we helped the nearby primary school to start their own veg patch. We wanted to give each child something to take home, so we made grow bags from recycled fabric, each containing seeds of an easy-to-grow vegetable, instructions and identification tags.

It’s been a success so far, and we hope to expand, running workshops for our community and other interested schools.