Ntawuyanje Innocent, is a teacher at Groupe Scolaire Rusuzumiro in Nyaruguru, a district in the south of Rwanda. Innocent and his family’s lives changed after his fellow teacher attended an agriculture training provided by Gardens for Health International (GHI) and shared his experience with him.

Gardens For Health | Home Grown School Feeding — Innocent preparing his home garden

When a fellow teacher broke the news about a training they had just received, he became eager to learn more from his friend and started to try out some of the vegetable farming techniques and the one-pot-one-hour technique of preparing a healthy meal.

Innocent used to grow all kinds of food at his home but not vegetables. They would buy those from the market. But since he got a fair share of GHI’s training, the family is able to enjoy fresh vegetables from their own garden. When you ask him to compare their life now and when they used to eat vegetables from the market, he says nothing is better than this because they are all able to eat any type of vegetable they want at any time.

“I used to grow beans and maize only in this entire piece of land. But of course it would not be enough, the family can’t feed on those alone so I would have to buy vegetables and other items from the market”. Says Innocent

Even though he is often given seeds to carry home by GHI’s field staff, Innocent says he has also learnt to preserve seeds especially from his Amaranth garden so he can have enough for the following season. The school also continues to provide Sukuma Wiki, onions and carrots for planting. But that’s not all, whenever their seedlings are ready, he also gets those freely.

“If one teacher did not share this good news with me, my family and I wouldn’t be able to afford healthy meals like we do now. I also take every opportunity I get to share the same information especially on the value of growing vegetables at home with fellow parents.”

Innocent with his family at their creative vegetable garden

Since he started getting information about improving Agriculture and Nutrition, Innocent and his wife have also become creative. Instead of throwing old tins, basins and other items, they now repurpose them for planting vegetables.

Vegetable Farming Transforms Teacher’s Life