One-fourth of children in South Africa suffer from stunting due to malnutrition and around 13–15 million people have either inadequate or severely inadequate access to food. Farming knowledge in South Africa has been lost over generations; with few employment opportunities available in rural areas, small-scale farming holds vast potential for these communities.
Through ongoing mentoring and support, our Organic Farming Programme empowers community members to sustainably improve household nutrition, strengthen self-reliance, and build a local economy.
Infrastructural Support
Common obstacles in farming include water inaccessibility and crop devastation due to roaming animals. We provide fencing, tools, and irrigation that are shared by all participants.
Individual Plots
Famers are held personally accountable for making use of their individual plots, giving each farmer autonomy over his/her crops while working as a group for the farms’ success.
Driven by Impact
To track growth of individual participants, farmers are categorised per the development stages: Survivalist, Subsistence, Early Livelihoods, and Livelihoods.
Training & Mentoring Approach
Our key differentiator is the extensive and ongoing mentoring and training provided by our locally hired Farming Facilitators to ensure each farmers’ success. Many people in our community lack the knowledge and skills necessary to compete for jobs in urban areas and suffer from feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem. Our training model places heavy emphasis on self-development, global perspective and confidence building, as well as the practical side of organic farming. These practical farming skills include knowledge of soil and planting skills (i.e. composting, mulching, watering, spacing, seedlings), how to effectively use organic fertiliser and how to track their production from soil preparation to consumption or sale.
Game-changing Skills Model
Farmers are treated as autonomous individuals and are held accountable for their responsibilities and actions, encouraging self-reliance and inspiring them to thrive. Our Game-changing Skills we focus on developing are empathy, perspective, self-esteem, creativity, and critical thinking. Empathy gives farmers the ability to work through conflicts and interpersonal issues. Perspective allows farmers to see themselves as global citizens and have the contextual framework to understand their personal needs within a bigger matrix. Self-esteem gives Farmers the confidence to overcome feelings of jealousy and regard themselves as small business owners. Creativity helps to develop creative solutions to problems and critical thinking gives farmers the ability to plan ahead, anticipate challenges, and create their own access to markets.
Market Access & Agri-Hub
We provide market access and linkages to school feeding scheme brokers and local spaza shop owners, and also guarantee to purchase any excess produce to mitigate the risk of scaling up production. Produce purchased through our guaranteed market is used in our ECD & After-school Feeding Schemes or sold to retailers. Although farmers have the flexibility to decide to whom their produce is sold, our Market System mitigates the risk associated with scaling up production. Additionally, our Agri-Hub (located at our Community Centre) enables farmers to receive additional assistance and purchase various inputs (seedlings, chicken feed, etc.) thereby eliminating the need for farmers to find transportation to the nearest seedling nursery which is approximately 60km away.
Mdedelwa “MDex” Mkhize is a father, a mentor, a manager, and most importantly, a hero. MDex joined Thanda in 2015 as a Farming Facilitator and now manages our Organic Farming Programme. He was born in the nearby community of kwaQwabe and after matriculating, he attended Mangosuthu University of Technology where he obtained his diploma in Community Extension. He is passionate about helping his community become self-reliant and resilient. In the future, he would like to see his country find solutions to close the gap between rural areas and cities. He is a true family man with two young children and stays close with his parents, who he admires greatly. MDex is always laughing and makes everyone smile with his witty jokes!
The Shinga family has farmed with Thanda since 2015 and it is truly a familial activity – everyone contributes and sees the huge benefit from growing their own healthy foods. The oldest daughter, Sanelisiwe, recently started her own plot. At first, she thought, “farming is for the older people in our community,” but through Thanda’s training and mentoring she has seen that she can create a market for her produce and make a viable income.
“Having more access to food has changed our lives at home. We don’t buy from shops and in that way, we save money. We also eat fresh vegetables which is good for our bodies.”
– Bawinile from Mswilili farm