Low artificial input desert greening, with rainwater harvesting and mulching produces magic results that even the locals can’t at first believe. There are solutions to desert greening without using huge amounts of artificial fertilisers, plastic poly tunnels and wasting precious water.
Watch this if you’re interested in how we can feed the starving, particularly in desert regions like the middle east and the Sahara.
Thanks to Willem for this.
Sounds too good to be true. Just think of what it could do for the people in African desert areas.
“You can solve all the world’s problems in a garden”
I love that. And I believe it.
It does sound too good to be true but their belief in their results is infectious. It should certainly be tried in more areas. Tbh they’re probably just using ancient techniques long forgotten, with some modern technology thrown in. Sounds like a good recipe to me.
Dear Matt, thanks for your positive reaction. It is difficult for that little video to be false : the greening of a small part of the desert is undeniably there. Of course, it should be repeated on different continents and under different conditions. But I believe in it, because it is founded on simple scientific laws.
Similarly, I believe that people in the drylands should supplement their traditional agricultural and horticultural practices with “container gardening” – see my blog
http://containergardening.wordpress.com
in particular my messages on gardening in plastic bottles and plastic bags.
My experiments showed a maximal water use efficiency for a maximal production of all kinds of food crops (food security and poverty alleviation). Moreover, kids and people could thereby avoid pollution of their environment by eliminating the continuous littering of plastic (it’s a real shame to see all that plastic flying around).
By the way, why don’t your readers personally contribute to the greening of the desert by sending me the seeds of all the melons, watermelons, papayas and other tropical fruits they are eating at home? Don’t throw them in your garbage bin, simply wash them a bit, let them dry, put them in an envelope and send them to me at:
Prof. Dr. Willem Van Cotthem
Beeweg 36
B9080
ZAFFELARE
Belgium
We will use them at our UNICEF projects for family gardens and school gardens in the Sahara.
Thanks for your effective contribution !
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Hi Willem
I’m very interested in this as I’ve travelled to parts of the middle east in my younger days and worked for a couple of months on a desert farm that was growing tomatoes and melons.
I was amazed to see these plants growing out of the sand! After a while I realised they must be feeding liquid fertilizers via the water feeding drip system. When the farmer asked me to spray the melons with a chemical I found out this was to force the melons to go from green to their ripe yellow colour while in transit to market.
This of course can’t be good for the environment, is no doubt an expensive process for the farmer and the fruit is probably not so healthy for the customer.
Regarding the collecting of seeds: I’m very happy to do this and will start with the watermellon in our family’s fridge! My daughter will love to get involved with this. She is at primary school.
Maybe once school begins again we could involve the pupils of my daughter’s class with such an exercise.
P.S. I will check out your link later regards container planting. I’ve just got in the door.
I’ve noticed you don’t seem to have had any update since July last year – so I was just checking that you were still operational. I was actually looking to see if water melon seeds were edible and came across your site – it will give me patience taking seeds from fruit, cleansing it and drying to send to you – so if you could confirm or otherwise it would be appreciated. Thank you and God Bless you in your commitment to third world countries.
Eds note: This comment is directed to Willem’s ‘Desertification’ blog. Comments regarding this post (the idea for which came from Willem’s blog) are running on this blog and his, via ‘pingback’.