When we heard from Your Planet Doctors about their new campaign, ‘Grow Your Own Rainbow Garden’, we couldn’t have been more thrilled to be involved. The goal of the campaign was to encourage the local Christchurch residents to work together and give them the resources and knowledge they need to make their own fruit & vegetables.
With the help from the team at Grounded Community and the residents, Your Planet Doctors were able to install 44 raised beds and horticulture specialist, Lawrence Camilleri, has been teaching the residents how to grow their own fruit & veg. In total, we donated 11 bulk bags of Eco Fruit & Veg Topsoil and 3 bulk bags of Eco Fruit & Veg Compost to fill the raised beds and give the residents produce the best starting chance!

Dr Anne Hayden, the director and founder of Your Planet Doctors and the GYORG campaign, shared “The pilot is already showing that teaching people in small groups how to grow their own food and cook their produce is a powerful way to bring them together and that community initiatives can spring spontaneously from this.

The plan is for participating residents to enter into a crop swap credit system. The more produce they each harvest for delivery to the ForeverMore Food farm, nearby, the less they pay for a generously stocked food box, much of which has been chemically free and regeneratively grown on the farm with recipes included. ”

The project started in June 2021 to May 22 when the raised beds were installed, however it continues to grow as the word spreads and more communities want to take part! Over the next few weeks, they will be installing at least another 100.
As the project evolves, we will carry on helping them however we can.