GAUTENG
COMMENT, by Pete Bower
MAGAZINE
HOW TO MAKE YOUR PLOT PROFITABLE
Vol 16 No 11
November 2015
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FRONT COVER
Lunchtime in the shade. Zenzele Farm
near Hartbeespoort’s first two litters
of Colebrook piglets are now for sale.
Call Jens on 082 447-5080
Teach your kids
A
t its most simple level to grow the average plant requires only
the four “S's”. Seed, soil, sun and sustenance, in the form of
nutrients and water. And vegetables are, in essence, among the
simplest and most average of plants.
So why does a large proportion of the world's population (and even the South African
population) go to bed hungry each night? Why don't more people grow their own food?
These questions were particularly pertinent last month as we marked World Food Day
on October 16. No, the earth didn't move for us either on the 16th and we wonder,
actually, about the value of any of these awareness-raising days designated by a bunch
of, presumably, United Nations pony-tails and covering everything from trees (Arbor
Day) to toilets (World Toilet Day, coming up this month on the 19th.)
The point is that if the problem is big enough to warrant having its own awarenessraising day designated to it by the UN pony-tails, anybody with half a brain in government, welfare organisations and civil society generally will be fully aware of it. And
anybody who isn't aware of the problem is hardly going to be goaded into feverish
action as a result of some desultory reportage of boring political speeches, marches and
events held on the day as awareness-raising campaigns (which, at the risk of being
labelled curmudgeonly, I would point out are funded by you and me, the taxpayers).
In fact, in our view days like World Food Day afford politicians and their ilk an opportunity to over-complicate an issue, and offer a platform to too many organisations, big and
small, to air their partisan views, which may simply be sales pitches and unhelpful in the
overall debate.
And around food, in South Africa at least, what is the overall debate? Simple: at a
household level, in many instances people are not food-secure ~ they don't have
enough to ensure they can feed themselves sustainably and nourishingly every day. This
is extended to certain communities, particularly the poor in rural areas, and is invariably
exacerbated by external factors such as drought. In fact, it may be entire provinces that
are food-insecure as a result of their poor populations and drought. And some argue
that South Africa as a country is, or at least is fast becoming, food-insecure.
Yet on the other hand, the rich eat to excess and either become obese as a result (and
suffer and die from obesity-related ailments such as heart and liver disease, strokes,
diabetes etc) or spend much of their income and many hours working off the extra
pounds running on treadmills and sweating in gyms.
And still among the rich, households, restaurants, hotels and retailers throw away
thousands of tons of food daily, either because people simply couldn't or didn't finish
what was on their dinner plates or because the stuff is past its sell-by date on a shop
shelf. This is not a South African problem alone. The same pertains in wealthy societies
worldwide but the tragedy is much more stark when food being slid off a plate into a
bin in Sandton could sustain a hungry, malnourished child in next-door Alexandra.
The rich-poor-food-wastage issue is, of course, a function of our grossly unequal society
and let's not dwell further on that now.
Rather, let's look at what can be done to ensure food-security for all, and that's to
encourage people to take care of themselves and to provide for themselves. In other
words, to ܛ