An inspiring story of how permaculture changes lives
Denzel Rasimphi lived in the Vhembe district, Makhado Limpopo. At age 15 he was orphaned along with his 5 sisters. Denzel and his sisters were living in a shack made from wooden poles and plastic when Ukuvuna was sponsored to do a Permaculture training in the area in 2006.
John Nzira took Denzel under his wing, trained him in Permaculture methods, and provided a further weeklong training for Denzel in Johannesburg. Within a year of the training, Denzel was feeding his little family and had saved enough money through the sales of excess food to build a two-roomed brick house with a corrugated iron roof. He continues to work part-time in his garden and part-time at a car wash.
We are happy to report that Denzel is happy and flourishing and is now a strapping young man. In September 2012, Denzel continued his training with John in Johannesburg. Denzel’s goal is to become a fully qualified trainer in the Makhado district of Limpopo. We will help him to source funding from NGO’s once qualified.
It has long been a dream of mine to sell my property in Midrand and to buy a farm in the Western Cape. I feel that I would like to help those less fortunate to earn a living using their own skills. I have been planning this for years and have a NPO, The Future Seed, that will be properly launched once we start farming.
Maxwell Khumalo, currently an uber driver, and Simba Mubaiwa.who is unemployed, share the dream. They will move with us with their families to the Western Cape. We have been planning together what we will grow on our farm and how we will include training for local communities not only in permaculture principles but how to become entrepreneurs themselves to sell to the local B & B’s and restaurant markets. We have also been discussing how we will get funding for the training of the communities along with John Nzira from Ukuvuna Urban farming who is an established trainer for many years and has been an amazing mentor and role model to all of us.
It seems that Maxwell and Simba got tired of waiting for my property to sell! They decided that the time to grow is now, no matter where we are. So they have taken the initiative and wherever there is spare ground on my one hectare property that is not used by my 2 horses they have started growing food for the local market. In every little corner we have a new garden springing up with what ever is in season now. We have always had a small garden for home use and this is the first time that we have expanded the growing area for resale.
My biggest surprise has been the quality of the food. The lettuces, broccoli, spinach, cabbage and mustard leaves have been absolutely spotless and huge, without using any organic sprays whats so ever. The guys have made compost using my horse manure, we have our own worm farm and regularly use the worm tea and compost to feed the plants and companion planting has also helped. It also seems that the love and care that the guys have invested have paid off along with their green fingers.
We will continue to work as a team until such time as we can live our larger dream in the western cape.
