By Rasheed Khalid
Green Circle Organisation (GCO) is launching urban farming campaign in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi soon after Eidul Azha and kitchen gardening will be its important component.
Disclosing this, Rana Shafiq-ur-Rehman, President of GCO, told ‘The News’ that it is originally a Cuban model. The revolutionary government of President Fidel Castro after a US ban on supplies of foodstuff to the Latin American island state, had given a slogan of ‘Grow your own vegetables’ to the citizen and every household was provided assistance by the government. The Cubans started gardening in containers, empty boxes and on rooftops of their houses and soon the vegetable crisis was overcome.
He said that when vegetables reach cities, they no longer remain fresh, their cost multiplies and products also involve pesticides and chemical fertilizers. He said that organic vegetables are more hygienic, delicious and have high nutrition value.
He said that GCO would motivate and train the people to resort to using relatively spacious lawns and beds they have in their households for agriculture for which atmosphere of the federal metropolis is already conducive. He said that we would provide kits, guidance and if need be even seeds and manure for the purpose. He dispelled the myth that the Potohar region is not suitable for growing fruit trees saying we can show many households in the city having a variety of fruit trees already giving production which includes Anwar Ratol, Chaunsa and Sindhrhi varieties of mango and all types of citrus fruit save to talk of walnut, almond, pomegranate, apples, peaches, pears, persimmon etc.
He said that medicinal plants, herbs and useful flowers like aloevera, neem, kachnar, moringa, rocket salad, amla can also be grown here. He said that the GCO wants a shift from plantoscap to vegiscape. He said that very little space is required to produce mushrooms and honey. He appealed environmentalists and organic vegetable lovers to help GCO in this respect.
A Kitchen Gardening Club had already been established under the auspices of the NGO. He said that its membership had already been launched. In this connection a joint venture of GCO and Green Man Project of National Training Bureau, Ministry of Labour, are starting a 5-day training course on kitchen garden in the first week of December.