The Constantia Rotary Club of Capetown, South Africa, has helped set up a community garden and farm training center for young residents. They noted that as thousands of people had migrated to the city seeking employment, the opportunities were not keeping up. So they combined the increased need for fresh food as well as for jobs and established the community garden. The club is working with a local organization that helps create income-producing gardening opportunities and partnered with Rotary clubs in the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany to secure a global grant from The Rotary Foundation worth $46,000.

“The philosophy behind both projects is to try to get young people, men and women, into the gardens,” said Kelly Winckworth, treasurer of the Constantia club. “Traditionally, this kind of work is for older people and largely women.”

Settled in a grassy park across from a subdivision of modest brick homes is the Moya Khaya Peace Gardens plot. The garden adds farming capacity and creates more financial stability for the area.

“We grow everything,” said operations director Christina Kaba, who works in the garden with about a dozen others, growing pumpkins, green peppers, basil, thyme, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage and lots of other vegetables and herbs.

Those vegetables supply the Harvest of Hope venture, which sells boxes of vegetables to middle-class Capetonians for a monthly fee. Just one more example of Rotarians working to improve people’s lives around the world.