A partnership to transform the Gladstone Village community from one consisting of subsistence crop farmers to a set-up of commercially viable farming has begun to yield the desired results.
Efforts since 2019 have seen the community sustain potatoes on 2 ha of available land. This farming village on the outskirts of Thaba Nchu is supported by the Central University of Technology (CUT), Free State’s, branch of the student organisation Enactus and Patriot Vision in Action, a non-profit organisation from Lesotho.
The Enactus CUT students are working with the youth of Gladstone Village through the Enactus Village FA (Crop Farming) Project to improve the local economic development of their village and to assist the community to produce crops for the commercial market.
Kabelo Makhetha, Enactus CUT project manager, said a lack of the right skills and knowledge had hampered the prospects of a transformation from subsistence farming into commercial farming, which is key for job creation.
“We have managed to grow the project from small-scale farming to commercial farming since 2019. These people have land and the motivation, but they don’t have resources.”
Makhetha said the current focus was on harvesting rainwater and developing irrigation systems to ensure sustainability.
Water harvesting will be done by channelling streams to a reservoir that is close to the farming land.
