BENGALURU: Amid rising concretisation in urban areas and lack of clean water to grow vegetables, fruits and any agricultural produce, Gandhi Krishi Vigyan Kendra (GKVK) is organising an Urban Gardening Training Programme for people across all age groups, especially homemakers, so that gardening is not just a hobby but also a means to grow vegetables organically, without using pesticides or insecticides.
Dr S V Suresha, Vice-Chancellor, GKVK, explained, “Though our clients are farmers, we thought we could expand our client list this time by training homemakers and others in urban gardening. The urban gardening programme mainly focuses on homemakers. Besides, we have come across research studies showing that consuming vegetables and fruits grown using pesticides and water that contains heavy metals has impacted physical and mental health. Therefore, we thought of conducting sessions with experts, resource persons who are already into it and help homemakers cultivate vegetables in small quantities for self-consumption.”
He added, “We conduct these sessions in the nursery, which is available on our campus itself. So far, we have conducted eight sessions, and each session has 30 participants who come from various backgrounds, including retired employees, homemakers and a few youngsters who are curious to know how to make compost, potting and repotting, duration of providing water to plants and more.”
When asked that potting, repotting, and even making compost can be learnt from videos on YouTube, Suresh said, “Many people who come for our sessions have admitted that despite seeing these videos, they weren’t able to grow vegetables and fruits successfully. They might have failed to understand how to prepare compost or have watered the plants too much, which resulted in them dying.
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