The Suurbraak community near Swellendam in the Western Cape has embarked on aqua-ponic farming. It’s a combination of hydroponics and aquaculture. Hydroponics involves growing crops with their roots only in water and not soil.
Aquaculture is the growing and farming of fish. The fish fertilise the water, which in turn provides nutrients to the crops. The method uses 90% less water than traditional farming.
Reinette Heunis from the Mawubuye land rights forum, says the project is about empowering the local women.
“We want the project to be sustainable and we want to create jobs for the women who are participating in the project here in Suurbraak. We are six women that are going to be working here and the duties will be different because we also have a nursery here and two of the women will be working and maintain the nursery and they will make sure that we have enough seedlings that we can bring to the aquaponics system,” says Heunis.
