With all the uproar over whether children should sell soft drinks in school some say the question should really be: should schools even sell soft drinks? It taste's great, but those sweet carbonated beverages don't give much nutrition.
And that's why the Ministry of Agriculture is proposing an alternative: imagine drinking fresh fruit juice and eating fresh vegetables every day drawn from crops grown on campus. That's the Ministry's vision for what's basically a revitalization of the REAP Program from the 1980's. Alfonso Noble found out what'll make it work this time around.
Alfonso Noble Reporting, [from Central Farm]
Teachers, agricultural officers as well as Ministry of Education personnel gathered at the University of Belize's Faculty of Agriculture in Cayo to discuss ways of implementing agriculture into the existing school curriculum.
Hon. Servulo Baeza, Minister of Agriculture
"We are trying to see where and how we can integrate more of the concept of school gardens into the educational system starting off from the primary school up to the secondary school level. They used to exist a program which was what we called REAP and that slowly went out and had a natural death. What we have tried to do is to revive it and formalize it again. It won't exactly be that same program but to formalize some sort of program, which we are calling the school garden program. Some schools have been doing it on an ad-hoc basis. You know just because they have a teacher who is interested and so on they started off."
Wanting to move away from that ad-hoc way of teaching agriculture in the primary schools, the Ministry organized today's school garden forum. Melanio Pech coordinator of the food security program says that this gathering is ideal for the idea to get across.
Melanio Pech, Coordinator - Food Security Program
"Several years ago we became concerned about agriculture being introduced in the school curriculum and for some reason or the other we have not been able to get these things together. However in the forum we expect as one of their major objectives to get the educators in one place, one location where we can actually come to a consensus together with the Ministry of Agriculture in terms of how best we can incorporate the curriculum of agriculture into the curriculum of schools."
And the reasoning here is two fold: for the economics of it and for the nutritional value.
Hon. Servulo Baeza,
"We want to show and teach our children from early that agriculture is something good and that once you apply yourself to it you can actually make money. I like to use the example of the Nuevo San Juan R.C. School where they get assistance through this project I mentioned. So they established a garden and we assist them with the irrigation and so on and we have an extension officer working very closely with them. They were able to grow quite a few different varieties of vegetables. They sold these vegetables right there in the village and they were able to get some to consume. They made money. So you hear from the Ministry of Heath and Education that kids go to school hungry and they are not eating the right amount of food and we have statistics which show you that one of the leading cause of death is our lifestyle. We don't eat very healthy food. So if we start from early growing tomatoes or leafy vegetables our kids will start to eat these things. And if they eat these things they will certainly be more healthy and be able to apply themselves more in school. So then there is the nutritional part of it."
Melanio Pech, Coordinator
"Most of the times students graduate from primary school but are not able to further their studies so students will have something to do. They were trained in agriculture from early so they will be expected to go back into their farms with their parents and assist. That is one form of employment. We are hoping that from a very early age the students are involved in something they will really appreciate. In fact producing a backyard garden in our school yard we consider very important that students improve their health and their standards of living by consuming vegetables that is produced in the schools. We are very certain that by improving their health students will perform much better in schools. So that is one way of securing food security because food security is not just necessarily producing food to eat but it is also improving the standards of living also."
And to get this done Baeza says it only takes the effort of a single persons with enough dedication and drive to see the program bin the schools succeed.
Hon. Servulo Baeza,
"All we need really is one person. Whether it be the principal or one teacher who is dedicated to the program and the program can work. We just need one person who has that dedication and want to make it work."
Hopefully today's sampling will include such persons to take agriculture from the market into the classrooms.
The task of spreading the program is now with the ministries of agriculture and education who have committed to work together to complete it.