Miss Namibia 2018, who is also the Director of the Innonation Foundation, Selma Kamanya, has reiterated the call to provide children with nutritious food.

Kamanya said this at the handover of a backyard garden to the Bernard Norkamp Centre in Windhoek.

Among the vegetables to be produced here are spinach, tomatoes, green peppers, and sweet corn.

The intention is to feed about 130 vulnerable and orphaned children at the Bernard Norkamp Centre.

"They provide academic support to children in the Katutura neighbourhood and work to strengthen children's academic proficiencies, and they also ensure that the children receive one meal per day, and I can't wait for them to be able to say that they have been served a nutritious lunch from the veggies that they have picked from their garden," said Kamanya at the handing over ceremony.

The Director of the Church Alliance for Orphans (CAFO), Jacky Hoff, hopes the garden will make a difference in the lives of the children.

"This is the beggar's plea for the children of this centre to learn to become self-sufficient and generate a surplus. It is the beginning to escape poverty and to have healthy diets, improve the environment, and hopefully generate income to build a better future."

The Marketing and Communications Manager of Agribank, Rino Muranda, commended the project for imparting agricultural skills to young children, as agriculture is most commonly known to be for adults.

"Nowadays, agriculture is regarded by many as a grey economy as it is meant for elders only. When those ones leave us. We will know that our young ones know about it. If they continue with this passion, we know we have a sustainable agricultural chamber."

Muranda urged the beneficiaries to take care of the garden.

This project is the first-ever Inno-Grows hydroponic urban farming unit.

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Maria Kaalushu