A food-security program started聽almost 20 years ago is bearing fruit for generations of participants.
Access to food that is healthy, nourishing and culturally appropriate is the premise behind the Family Garden and Teaching Garden programs.
Started in 2002, the Family Garden Program works with 55聽Tsartlip households (approximately one-third of the community), building backyard gardens and growing a variety of fruits and vegetables.
鈥淲e started the program almost 20 years ago when local families identified food security as important to them,鈥� said Mary Hayes, co-ordinator of the program for the Tsartlip First Nation. 鈥淲e identified that the best way to help the community was to teach them how to help themselves.鈥�
The programs, a partnership between the Victoria Community Food Hub Society and Tsartlip First Nation, uses food as a community-building tool 鈥� the reason to bring people together and break bread.
Sharing food also strengthens community connections and helps reduce social isolation.
鈥淲e invite people to workshops several times a year to show them how to plant, talk about soil and composting,鈥� said Hayes. 鈥淕ardening is a renewable skill, something that we fine-tune and continue to build on.鈥�
Participants are also encouraged to visit the community kitchen, where they cook what is in season and learn how to can and preserve the remainder. Staff offer supplies and mentoring to gardeners throughout the growing season.
Funds from a grant from the Victoria Foundation this year will go toward purchasing a tractor to help plow fields, an instrumental part of the program.
The Teaching Garden is located next to the health centre, which provides programming on the role of traditional Indigenous plants as food and medicine.
The hands-on garden is popular with children and parents who attend the infant-toddler and after-school programs.
Hayes said that when she passes the garden, she sometimes sees a gentleman, one of the original members of the program, tending to plants with his son and, more recently, his grandson.
For more information, go to tsartlip.com.
