“Agriculture activities have been receding for many years now in most of the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) cities thus its main functions are being hindered. Despite the negative pressures, crop cultivation and animal husbandry remain common throughout the region’s cities. Fertile agricultural areas are still considerable and are expected to remain productive for years to come. Urban agriculture in the MENA countries is at present a highly diverse and widespread activity, yet it still suffers from lack of recognition form the planners, agriculturists, policy-makers, researchers and even by its practitioners.”

Link to ‘Urban Agriculture in the Middle East and North Africa’ Web Site here.

From: ‘Ideas that will catch on here.’
July 12, 2008, BBC

“Another fantastic idea I picked up – which could make its way onto my allotment before long – is the keyhole veg bed. This is a raised bed with bells on: it’s about 1m (3′6″) high, and the outer bed, where the vegetables are growing, slopes down from a central hollow column. There’s an access path to the column (giving the bed a “keyhole” shape viewed from above) and inside it is what amounts to a compost bin, held in with hessian: you fill it with kitchen waste, stable manure, grass clippings – whatever you’d put on your compost heap.

Then tip on water saved from your washing up, and that’s it. “The idea is that the water will drain through and take all the nutrients with it,” explains Kirstine. “It’s feeding from below the topsoil, so rather than watering on the surface and all the water evaporating, everything’s coming up from underneath.” In Africa, this garden will feed a family of six through the three-month dry period, when crops in the fields simply dry out.”

Keyhole Gardens at Send a Cow.

Below, a video titled: Lesotho – Make a Keyhole Garden

“A great little video made in Lesotho, showing how a group of schoolchildren made a keyhole garden. The charity Send a Cow showed them how to make it and the children can now make their own at home and have more food.”

Prof. Dr. Willem Van Cotthem, Honorary Professor University of Ghent (Belgium), has set up a wonderful program to help people in desertified regions.

“In every village of the developing countries where we have constructed family gardens and school gardens in the past, there is now less risk of famine. Indeed, we have shown the people and the children how to produce their own vegetables and fruit trees with a combination of traditional methods and modern technologies, e.g. soil conditioning to keep a garden soil moistened with a minimum of irrigation water. Such things are never forgotten, even if these people move to urban areas, where they will try to set up a tiny little garden.”

“That is the reason why I make this appeal upon you : please help us to collect seeds of vegetables and tropical fruits that can be grown in family gardens and school gardens in desertified regions.”

Read more here.