8/9/2019 Do Hungry People Need Trees or a Garden

1/2

Do hungry people need trees or a garden?

Prof. Dr. Willem Van Cotthem

University of Ghent (Belgium)

Today, a friend has sent a message, in which a short paragraph got my special attention:

'The ........................ (name ) Movement started a project in the Senegal many years ago. I

participated in the information campaign. The field workers planted about 20.000 Acacia trees.

Visiting the project one year later they saw that all the little trees dried out. The local people answered

that they had not enough water for the trees; they used it for their cows and goats. But how could we

plant 20.000 trees with ............. (name of a technology)? It would be too expensive!'

Here is my reply to him:

Dear Friend, you are completely right. All those big projects are doomed to be unsuccessful, simply

because a number of limiting factors (like water) will always hinder the achievement of the goals.

Instead of spending all the good money at reforestation without taking care of the hunger and poverty

of the local people, foreign aid should concentrate on agro-forestry, creating small family gardens and

surround these with fruit trees (these are TREES too ).

2009-02 - Burkina Faso, Niou village, Jardin des Femmes: community garden combined withmango trees, created in 1994 for the village women association Gueswende (Photo

Committee Maastricht-Niou)

We should not look first at economic return on our investment, e.g. planting trees and shrubs for

biofuel, but first of all eliminate hunger and diseases in a region, which is a conditio sine qua non to

count on the collaboration of the local population at reforestation projects in the future.

How can we ever justify that we 'help' the local people if our main objective is to gain 'something' for

ourselves?

8/9/2019 Do Hungry People Need Trees or a Garden

2/2

For me there is only one solution: first help the local people to decent food and then see how they can

really help us to create return on investment.

2009-02 Burkina Faso: Jardin Kabouda, a community garden created with the support of the

Committee Maastricht-Niou. A splendid example of combating hunger, child malnutrition and

poverty. (Committee Photo)

Unfortunately, it is always business as usual, even for some international organizations, surviving

thanks to the unsolved problems like hunger, child malnutrition and poverty, for which billions arecontinuously collected, without changing much at the grassroot level.

I get tears in my eyes thinking at all those poor people out there, seeing how billions are spent year

after year at what is called combating the problems.

Hunger, child malnutrition and poverty should be combated in the field itself, at the grassroot level, by

offering people a chance to grow their own fresh food and fruits in a private family garden or in a

community garden (see photos).

We will never win that war if we continue to ship only food (the ammunition) to the frontline, not the

necessary weapons (a fence, fertilizers, seeds, ...) to create gardens, the ideal platform for self-

sufficiency.

For sure: victory can be ours! Let us make the right strategic move.