{"id":977,"date":"2019-02-01T11:23:22","date_gmt":"2019-02-01T09:23:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/?p=977"},"modified":"2019-02-01T11:26:18","modified_gmt":"2019-02-01T09:26:18","slug":"growing-the-future-one-meal-at-a-time-for-safe-creche-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/?p=977","title":{"rendered":"Growing the future one meal at a time for SAFE cr\u00e8che kids"},"content":{"rendered":"
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GETTING DOWN TO IT: Farm children learn to grow their own food. Pictures by Katy Johnson<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tiny tots on SAFE farms are in for a daily treat that will keep them healthy and happy thanks to a 2019 veggie garden programme on all SAFE farms.<\/p>\n

“When it comes to learning, the environment, teacher and materials available are all vitally important; so is the child\u2019s ability to learn.<\/p>\n

“Here is where food plays a major role, as hungry children find it harder to concentrate and participate,’ says Katy Johnson who is married to Zwartfontein farm manager, Frankie.<\/p>\n

The SAFE vegetable garden initiative, which has begun on Zwartfontein, will be rolled out to all SAFE farms this year.<\/p>\n

“The idea is to provide the cr\u00e8che children and aftercare classes with a nutritionally packed vegetable salad, soup or stew every day. This is in addition to their lunch boxes packed by their parents, which are often very small and sometimes non-existent,” says Katy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I pop into the creche on Zwartfontein, I am always struck by what the children bring in their lunch boxes. It is often porridge, a slice of bread or a few beans with rice. It would be lovely to add some colour and nutrition to their lunches.\u201d<\/p>\n

SAFE wants to take this initiative one step further by rolling out a “toothbrush” initiative at the creches as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cOral hygiene is something most of us take for granted. However, for a lot of the children at Zwartfontein\u2019s cr\u00e8che a toothbrush appears to be a novelty. Some have horrendous abscesses and poor dental health. This could seriously handicap them in the future. We hope that bringing the concept of cleaning your teeth twice a day might make an impact on the oral hygiene of these children,” she says,<\/p>\n

“For many of us, fruit, vegetables and toothbrushes are everyday items that we often take for granted as part of a healthy lifestyle. We want to extend that expectation to our workers\u2019 children, ensuring they have good oral hygiene and at least one nutritionally packed meal a day”.<\/p>\n

The cr\u00e8ches play a key role, providing a safe and nurturing environment for preschool children while their parents work.<\/p>\n

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Creche children learning to grow their own lunch at SAFE\u2019s Zwartfontein farm<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The cr\u00e8ches also are a fun learning environment where the children can become \u201cschool-ready\u201d thanks to the constantly updated educational curriculum provided to SAFE by pre-school teacher, Ingrid Broodryk.<\/p>\n

According to Ingrid, the emotional, social and physical development of young children has a direct effect on their overall development and largely determines the adults they will become.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is why investment in very young children is essential for their future well-being \u2013 as well as the communities in which they live.<\/p>\n

Ingrid has set up programmes for the two cr\u00e8ches at SAFE\u2019s Bonathaba and Zwartfontein farms near Wellington, that SAFE is replicating on its farms around the country.<\/p>\n

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*Katy and Frankie moved to Farm Zwartfontein in September 2016 when Frankie was appointed Citrus Manager. While her primary job is looking after their two children, Ethan (4) and Aidan-Elise (1), Katy also runs her own business.<\/em><\/p>\n

A biologist by training, with a <\/em>Ph.D that merges biology with social sciences, Katy moved from the UK to South Africa in 2008 to follow her dream by working as a wildlife filmmaker in Kruger National Park. After 6 years of amazing adventures, becoming a Mum put a stop to beating around the bush for weeks on end.<\/em><\/p>\n

Katy now works for Forestry South Africa (FSA) communicating forestry through their public website www.forestryexplained.co.za<\/a> and their pesticide-related website www.tipwg.co.za<\/a>. She also writes digital marketing pieces for the fitness industry and has a jewelry start-up business, Dewdrop Jewellery, that is beginning to take off with a friend.<\/em><\/p>\n

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[1]<\/a>Growing Green Project was an unofficial term we used as a play on words, that we were growing greens and the tunnels were also green because we used recycled materials. I think as we don\u2019t have that included anymore, we should just keep it as veggie garden programme as this is something everyone will understand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tiny tots on SAFE farms are in for a daily treat that will keep them healthy and happy thanks to a 2019 veggie garden programme on all SAFE farms. “When …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/977"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=977"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/977\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":984,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/977\/revisions\/984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/safe.co.za\/SAFENews\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}