Scheed International implements and manages corporate, private and governmental
investment into social projects that better the lives of consumers, communities,
and the nation on a whole. The Grow a Heart- Start a
Farm campaign is a Scheed International initiative and was
officially introduced on August 30, 2013 in Trench Town.
Five (5) adventurous young men: Raneil McKenzie, Oneil Riley,
Keno Stewart, Paul Gregory, and Sheldon Harris from the Seaview Gardens
community decided to become the pioneers of the program. Three (3) of these
young men are unemployed and the other two (2) are entrepreneurs.
Scheed Cole the CEO of Scheed International received the vision
and made it his mission to embark on this campaign. In his opening statements to
the men present, he stated that this initiative was “God given and
God driven”. The purpose of the campaign is to address the issues
of poor nutrition, poverty and the lack of community involvement, by allowing
inner-city residents to take charge of their own destiny, especially where food
is concerned, through this urban farming. The vision is that this will blossom
into various business ventures which will change the face of communities by
empowering the members and expanding their capacity for change and advancement.
Scheed Cole who is a success story from the inner city, further stated that:
“We need to sacrifice our own self interest in order to help
others…If you want your own personal activity to
succeed, you must see to the success of others.”
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CEO Scheed Cole passionatly discusses Urban Farming with Innercity residents. |
The aim of the program is to create competencies in gardening and farming that
could be a source of employment and this technical skill may be used to develop
other similar communities.
The participants are enthusiastic, as well as receptive and
they feel like the initiative is very doable. After the presentation, they began
to discuss and identify material and places in the community where they can
start gardening. One of the participants, Raneil McKenzie, a positive and
driven individual, who hopes to have a career in music, enthusiastically shared
with us that he felt very excited about the campaign. After the presentation, he
was the first in the group to set up all his containers to start sowing seeds.
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A possible location for urban farming. |
The
Grow a Heart- Start a Farm
campaign will take a stage by stage approach, Scheed International will assist
with material and financial investment based on milestones met by the community
members. The first stage requires the participants to select their areas and to
prepare this space for plating by collecting various recycled materials, and
sourcing soil rich with nutrients suitable for planting vegetables. They are
schedule to get their seeds and start planting on Wednesday September 4, 2013 if
they manage to accomplish the first two task.
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Urban Farming location. |
The Grow a Heart- Start a Farm team
from Scheed International would like to wholeheartedly thank our partners Dr.
Henley Morgan founder of the Agency for Inner-city Renewal (AIR), who gave us
the blessed opportunity of using the conference room located at his HQ in
Trench Town, to host our first meeting, Craig Williams who sponsored the
catering, and MC Décor for sponsoring transportation, seeds and seeding
containers.
Be sure that we will continue to provide updates as the program
continues and follow the progress of the participants as they venture into
unchartered territory under the guidance of the Grow a Heart- Start
a Farm team of volunteers.
Submitted by: Melissia Bennett with Keisha DeLisser-Cole