Mini-greenhouses, first stdep to combat desertification

8/8/2019 Mini-greenhouses, first stdep to combat desertification

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Mini-greenhouses, first step to combat

desertification

Prof. Dr. Willem Van Cotthem

University of Ghent (Belgium)

This is the first part of a description of mini-greenhouses, made of simple and cheap

materials like yogurt pots, soda or juice bottles, mushroom trays, plastic bags etc. This kind of

inexpensive equipment to produce seedlings of vegetables and trees, e.g. fruit trees, is

available all over the world and almost free for all the poor, both in rural and urban areas.

Seedlings can be grown in mini-greenhouses with a remarkable minimum of irrigation water

(saving both water and fertilizer!); they can easily be transplanted in family (kitchen) gardens

or school gardens and their survival rate is dramatically higher than that of seedlings or

saplings grown with classical gardening practices.

The many advantages of this method make it an efficient first step to combat desertification

and to get around the problems of drought and soil poverty:

y To produce a maximum of seedlings with a minimum of water and fertilizer,y To grow seedlings in disposable pots, bottles or bags,y To grow seedlings close to the house instead of in the field,y To avoid the manifold problems of the garden soil,y To make use of significant educational aspects.

I intend to publish a number of variants on mini-greenhouse construction:

Part 1: Yogurt or other plastic pots.

Part 2: Plastic bottles

Part 3: Plastic trays

Part 4: Plastic bags

On all continents these materials are generally littered, dramatically enhancing pollution.

Streets and squares, road sides, fields, thorny trees, even the deserts are literally besmeared

with all kinds of plastic objects in the most diverse colours. That dirty plastic is not only

degrading the environment, it is also the source of many diseases, e.g. by condensing sewage

water underneath the plastic in the gutter. Therefore, it is recommendable to teach youth

how to recycle plastic bottles, pots, cups, trays, bags and the like by recycling them for

seedling production in mini-greenhouses (see below).

Part 1 : Yogurt or other plastic pots

On March 19, 2008, I already posted on my desertification blog

(http://desertification.wordpress.com ) an article on the use of yog(h)urt pots as mini-

greenhouses described as follows:

A major part of my life has been dedicated to the combat of desertification and alleviation of

poverty, in particular that of rural people in the drylands. One of my main objectives is to find

cost-effective ways of helping these people to get better standards of life and to offer them

opportunities to apply the best practices in that combat of desertification. Success stories have

been registered all over the world. Unfortunately, they are neither well known, nor applied at

the largest scale.


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Although some very efficient and cost-effective technologies and methods have been

repeatedly described and recommended, their application rate is still dramatically poor. One

wonders why it is seemingly easier for international and national organizations to spend

billions at enormous programs and projects than to provide reasonable financial means for

large-scale application of these inexpensive, but highly efficient best practices.

It may sound a bit discouraging, but it is not. Indeed, the day will come that decision-makers

will be aware of the necessity to turn to simple, efficient methods, instead of spending toomuch at non-productive and unsustainable initiatives. Not the profits for shareholders is

important, but the welfare of the poorest.

That is why my personal interest is focused on simplicity and cost-effectiveness, e.g. recycling

waste or saving valuable seeds from the garbage bin or compost heap (see our project Seeds

for Food at http://zadenvoorleven.wordpress.com and www.seedsforfood.org ). One should

never forget that viable seeds contain the embryo of new plant life!

Continuously looking for new opportunities for container gardening, a wonderful method for

producing food in the drylands, I did a lot of experiments with all kinds of transparent yogurt

pots. I thereby found an easy way to transform these pots into mini-greenhouses for a

windowsill or a table close to the window.

Below you will find some pictures explaining the functioning of my new (?) mini-greenhouses,

in which small quantities of seedlings can be grown before being transplanted. Maybe

someone did the same before, but up to now I didnt find traces of this method. Should you

have more information, dont hesitate to send it to me.

http://containergardening.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/p1020178.jpg

2008-03 (178) Mini-greenhouse made of 2 yogurt pots. Left: Lower part of one pot (cut off

with small scissors) used as a cup and put on the lid of that pot. Right: the second pot without

its lid.

http://desertification.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/p1020176.jpg

Mini-greenhouse before filling the cup inside with potting soil.

http://desertification.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/p1020179.jpg

Left: cup with Sorghum-seedlings in potting soil.

Right: yogurt pot used as cover.


2008-03 (185) The yogurt pot, covering the cup with Sorghum seedlings completely by

pushing it in the lid underneath, is perforated (4 little aeration holes) to allow minimal

evaporation and penetration of oxygen inside the pot. The covering pot can be lifted from time

to time to harden the seedlings before they will be transplanted.


2008-03 (186) Set of 3 mini-greenhouses with cherimoyas (Annona cherimola), lychees (Litchi

chinensis) and sorgho (Sorghum bicolor).

A large number of seedlings can be produced this way. Its a very interesting method to

produce tree seedlings with a minimum of water. These seedlings can later on go to the field

or garden; they can also be transplanted into a plastic bottle to allow further growth before

planting them in the field.

Advantages of this method:


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y Possibility to grow seedlings indoors (even before Spring in temperate regions, like inBelgium).

y Possibility to grow seedlings with a minimal quantity of water (avoiding droughtoutdoors) inside the house in the drylands (not in the garden outside).

y Easy way to check germination daily.y Easy way to regulate moisture level in the mini-greenhouse (lifting the transparent

yoghurt pot, covering the seed(lings), to aerate whenever needed).y Opportunity to choose the right moment (dimension of seedlings) for transplantation. y Opportunity to reuse the same mini-greenhouse multiple times (easy to clean after

transplantation).

This is a method that can tremendously help rural people in the drylands. It suffices to offer

them free heaps of yogurt pots (which should not be littered anymore, but washed and

cleaned!) to have them growing seedlings of certain crops in an optimal way, without having to

irrigate their garden daily with a huge quantity of water (isnt saving water in the drylands a

MUST?).

I wonder if one could not set up local or regional collecting points for these yogurt pots and

offer them afterwards to NGOs for their development projects in the drylands. Impossible?

Give us a good reason!

Anyway, it would be much easier than constructing a dam or a borehole to get more water.

For sure, mini-greenhouses are a giant step forward in the combat of desertification, because

saving a lot of water is a primordial task in all the drylands.

Let us go for it! And if you don't believe in it, just give it a try. You'll see!


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Mini-greenhouses, first stdep to combat desertification