BUYISWA Finca, 48, is part of the 1.74% of South Africans saved from hunger by growing their own food instead of depending on shops.

The mother of three lives in Poortjie, an area in Orange Farm identified by the City of Joburg as one of its poorest communities.

Here residents affected by high levels of unemployment are urged to create food gardens to feed their families.

Enrolled in the Community Work Programme (CWP), a government "employment safety net" initiative which has been instrumental in starting a number of food gardens in local schools in the area, Finca also has her own vegetable garden in her small back yard where she grows mealies, spinach, cabbage and beetroot.

"The only food items I buy with the childcare grant money I receive are oil and mealie meal. The food I grow in the garden supplements the grant money," said Finca, a single parent.

According to a recently released Oxfam research report, Hidden Hunger in South Africa: The Faces of Hunger and Malnutrition in a Food-Secure Nation, only 1.74% of households grow their own produce as their main source of food.

The report says, however, that 17% of all households cultivate some crops to supplement their food purchases, and in tribal and rural areas this figure increases to nearly 42%.

While social grants go a long way towards saving many South Africans from hunger, the poorest citizens spend 47.7% of their paltry income on food, it said.

". the median income for South African households is R3100 per month. Among those South Africans who earn less than the median, salaries, wages and commissions account for 32% of all incomes, social grants 42% and remittances 12%.

"32% of such households run out of money to purchase food on more than five days each month," reads the report, citing 2012 Stats SA figures.

This is in stark contrast to the country's "top 10% income group [which] earns 52% of total income . and [spends] only 10% of its income on food".

Finca started her back-yard vegetable garden, from which she is sometimes able to harvest extra produce to sell to neighbours, in 2012.

"There are no jobs in Poortjie," she said, explaining that, as a CWP member, she also regularly planted, tended and harvested a vegetable garden at the local Ahanang Primary School.

She and other CWP members said they received R500 a month from government.

There are 200 cooperatives of small-scale farmers in the City of Joburg and each comprises between five and 15 members. There are almost 2000 beneficiaries in total.

Lahliwe Mthembu, 44, who is also in the CWP, said there were benefits to doing the work of growing food at schools.

ndabezithat@timesmedia.co.za

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