Article and photos by Japie Muller
Food and water security may be the largest issues facing human survival. The
world’s population is estimated to reach 10 billion people in the next 40 years.
T
his means that humans will
have to expand agricultural
production of arable land
to approximately one billion hectares in order to grow
enough food to feed the rising population. Unfortunately, this amount
of arable land does not exist. According to FAO and NASA, eighty
percent of the land that is suitable
for farming is already in use. The
World Health Organisation estimates that 70 percent of the world
population will live in urban centres
by 2050.
While South Africa is one of the
more agriculturally productive
countries in Africa, a number of
recent events have highlighted how
vulnerable our food supply is to
drought, energy requirements, economics as well as government policy. Food prices have seen dramatic
fluctuations in recent years, primarily in response to natural disasters,
drought, and government mandates. According to all indications
this insecurity is only going to get
worse.
To complicate the issue, a smaller
percentage of the population is engaged in agriculture today than at
any other time in the history of
southern Africa. The result is a
knowledge gap that has removed
the knowledge and ability to farm
from a majority of the population.
In essence, we’ve forgotten how to
provide for ourselves and we take
for granted that the supermarket
shelves will always be stocked with
affordable food.
Sustainable Aquaponics
The “Food Independence” project is
an initiative that started in October
2013 by an entrepreneur from Cape
Town. Together with the University
of Stellenbosch the vision was to
build a sustainable “village aquaponics” system at the Welgevallen
Experimental Farm. This system
would be used for research and humanitarian purposes to support the
goals and objectives of Stellenbosch
Feeding in Action (SFIA). This is to
feed hungry, homeless, sick and
poor people in a humane way to
improve their quality of life. The
idea is to broaden this initiative to
other communities and to introduce
sustainable food growing models
throughout southern Africa. We
want to teach residents of these
towns, villages and neighbourhoods
how to maintain and operate their
own sustainable aquaponics system
and thus become more food independent.
The term “village aquaponics” refers to an aquaponic system specifically set up for the purpose of
providing an animal protein crop
(the fish) and a vegetable, herb or
fruit crop (the plants) to a specific
region surrounding the operation.
Commercial transportation of the
food produced in a village aquaponic system should not be necessary. Those living near the system
should be close enough to pick up
the fish and produce themselves.
The accessible radius could vary depending on where the system is
located. In a remote village, the
access may be by foot trains limiting the area the system can serve.