OYWT Garden

Work on the Trust’s whanau garden is now underway.

The planter boxes are in place and filled with a rich mix of goodies to grow the kai that will be part of our ongoing programme. 

A spiral herb garden takes pride of place in the centre of the planter boxes, and fruit trees from Jason Ross at Habitate and harakeke will form a wind break as well as providing fruit and fibre.

The students at the Otago Polytechnic’s He Toki pre-trade training programme built the planter boxes and this has sparked a fantastic reciprocal relationship.

The rangatahi we work alongside have been a big part of the project, gathering the seaweed and shoveling soil and compost into the boxes.  

We were grateful to have a helping hand from staff and rangatahi from Te Hou Ora Whanau Services and Oranga Tamariki as well.  

We have had support in funding and in kind from many organisations and businesses in the community including:

• Aukaha

• Doug Hall (Hall Brothers Transport)

• Nichols

• Bunnings

• DCC Community Grants

Going forward, our garden project intends to bring sustenance to our OYWT whanau.

Sustenance in its full definition, in that it will provide our whanau with nourishment for their bodies in the form of food and supply knowledge, connection and kotahitanga to sustain their mauri.

In a practical sense, our rangatahi will be involved in garden prep and maintenance, planting and harvesting kai and learning ways to prepare this food to share with their whanau.

We believe food is a universal connector and through growing our own food we can learn how we are all connected; to place, to each other and to our wider communities and environments.

Thank you to Lu Cox for the photos!