In Haiti, where most resources are scarce, non-existent, or very expensive, most Haitians are adept at “making do with what you’ve got” and making something work. Good garden space with good, fertile soil is too often scarce, so Wilner teaches his 2-year sustainable agriculture students how to make family-sized gardens from old tires. This week, the students got hands-on experience re-purposing used tires into effective and efficient family garden spaces.

You see the students cutting the bead off the old tires, then turning them inside out to form a nice garden “pot.” After filling the tires with their specially prepared soil medium that they learned about a few weeks ago, the new “gardens” are ready for seeds. These “appropriate technology” tire gardens can be used anywhere, and are easily cared for, watered, mulched, and harvested by a family, giving them reliable self-grown food right at home. At our ATC (Agricultural Training Center), we have many tire gardens demonstrated with a wide variety of things in them, from lettuce, onions, broccoli, carrots, and even red wiggler earthworms for making valuable vermicompost. This is an example of the “appropriate technologies” that we teach and demonstrate at our ATC that can easily improve daily life for any Haitian family. Your thoughtful support of our “development for sustainability” outreach helps Haitians learn to help themselves for the long-term. This is “food for life.” Thank you for your support because you are helping to change lives. God bless you.

Rad Hazelip, Assistant Executive Director