Melisizwe Cooperative (Uitenhage)

About 1.2 ha was accessed from the local Municipality and the Cooperative has a Permission-to-Occupy (PTO) certificate which stipulates an indefinite period. The team consists of one practitioner, an intern and four other members. Pigs are kept about 20m away from the main hub, providing supplies of manure to boost soil fertility. Currently all the produce is absorbed by the local community but there is a need to find additional markets as production increases.

Kungawo Amandla Coop (Makhanda)

This hub is operating at a school and a nearby clinic with the combined land amounting to about 1.5 ha. There is high demand for green produce in the town and the hub supplies the school with vegetables once a week. One practitioner manages the hub together with an intern and an established management committee. The hub is working with ten backyard gardens operating in Joza, Zolani and in recently occupied Enkanini locations. Since there is no established nursery for this hub, the group produces its own seedlings using seedbeds.

Silwanendlala Coop (Manxeba Village, Sterkspruit)

This hub is situated in Senqu Municipality, about 100 km from Aliwal North, one of the most arid areas of the Eastern Cape. The hub is run by a group constituted by about 80% youth, who received agroecology training in 2021. About 0.8 ha has been acquired for vegetable and herb production, with one practitioner and one intern leading the work. The hub has already established eight food gardens and works with the government’s Community Works Programme to assist with establishing home gardens. A management committee assists with directing the focus of the hub.

Berlin AE Hub

This hub is situated in Berlin, 20 km east of King William’s Town, in one of the rain belts of the Eastern Cape. Currently this hub works with 20 homestead gardens. This hub includes features such as a garden, nursery, seed bank, orchard, storeroom, office and composting area. A variety of vegetables and field crops are being grown as well as vetch, a leguminous ground cover that serves to boost soil fertility in winter and can be used to feed livestock. The hub has set up links with a market in East London near the harbour. The hub has also linked the homestead gardens to street vendors in Berlin.

Makhotyana AE Hub (Libode)

This hub is on 3 ha of land which belongs to Development Education and Leadership Teams in Action (DELTA). The hub is very close to a waterway making it easy to access water for irrigation. The hub practises minimal tillage, soil preparation has been completed, kraal manure and mulching applied.

AE Hubs

The association identified cooperatives with sufficient, arable farmland who agreed to make available some portions of their farms for the establishment of Agroecology Hubs. There are five cooperatives, including the MFA Agroecology Training Centre, which has offered to give such land for the creation of five hubs.

The association has identified five people with agroecology background as practitioners and five youth as interns to oversee these hubs. Each of the five Hubs has organized more than 30 farmers (predominantly women working on homestead gardens) whom they will be working with for the entire duration of the program. A supporting committee for each Hub has been established.

AE Centre

The Centre is run by a young man who is a qualified agroecologist. Income generating vegetable crops such as spinach, onions, okra, mustard and cabbages are grown and sold in an effort to make the Centre self-sustainable. The produce is sold to the surrounding communities at reasonable prices.

The Centre works with more than 60 homestead gardens in the surrounding villages including the Daniel and Ndhambi villages. The team also identified child-headed households and provide support in the form of vegetables twice a week.

In 2022, the Centre hosted 10 youths (with an additional 70 others, whom we placed on other cooperatives for the same capacity building purposes) who received theory lessons from Gumela Projects and practical exposure from the Centre. Part of what they learned was how to select crops earmarked for seeds selection, mulching and the rationale for this practice, water conserving irrigation system and irrigation programs, pests and diseases scouting and the importance of crop rotation to mention just a few. The group has graduated from the program and received certificates of competence. These youth continue to volunteer their time to assist the production team at the Centre which is an indication of the impact we made in developing the love for land and land use amongst youth.

There are currently two AE hubs in the Free State and there are plans to expand to other areas. One of the hubs belongs to Botshabelo Unemployed Movement (BUM) and the other one belongs to the Free State Rural Women’s Assembly (FSRWA).

Botshabelo Unemployed Movement Hub

The BUM hub is located in central Botshabelo. It is on a well-secured 0.5 ha piece of land leased from a municipal complex with access to water. The land has been cropped with diverse vegetables. There is however a challenge with the irrigation system – currently the team is using watering cans and an old hose pipe. The practitioner has initiated a very interesting undertaking, moving around with his team looking for homesteads with no gardens. Once they enter into an arrangement with the landowner – the team uses the land while the owner will have access to fresh produce once a week once it is ready.

Free State Rural Women’s Assembly Hub

This hub is situated in the western part of Botshabelo. The hub serves multiple purposes: production of fresh food for the nearby community and as a training and learning site. The site also serves as a mobilising tool for the movement and will be used for advocating for land of their own, as this one is on a leasehold. This hub has given rise to more than 50 household gardens, as those trained in the hub are required to practise what they have learnt. Given the distance from the community some form of transport is needed, as there is a problem if the member who owns a car is absent and it is very risky for women to walk alone through the bushes. The FDRWA was thus given a bakkie by TCOE.

Robertson

This hub is stationed in the north of Robertson near the Langeberg mountain. The hub has a nursery and produces seedlings which is distributed to households in the surrounding community. The hub practises bokashi composting and also makes use of vermiculite. Various vegetables are grown at the hub, depending on the season, which include beans, onions, beetroot, green peppers, cabbage and potatoes. The hubs also has chickens, pigs and geese.

Suurbrak

This one hectare hub is run by five women. The hub has an onsite aquaponics centre. Depending on the season, vegetables such has cabbage, sweet potatoes, broccoli, lettuce, spinach, beetroot, butternut and cauliflower are grown. Seedlings are distributed to nearby home gardens, at Mawubuye Land Rights Forum meetings and on occasion to surrounding hubs such as the Genadendal hub. The site has a worm farm which produces worm team which is used as produce organic fertiliser for soil amendments. The hub has a contract to supply the provincial Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development with 50kg of spinach a week.

Genadendal

This 2 Ha hub is on a 12 Ha piece of land which belongs to Mawubuye Land Rights Forum farmer, Mr Johannes Hansie. This land is fairly flat and will be used for the production of fodder. There is high demand for Lucerne in the area and as such, the focus will be on its production which will be bailed before selling. The hub has a functional irrigation system.