Empowering People to use Energy to Access Healthy Nutritious Food

Energy 4 a cause project is about empowering people with a capacity to choose to spend energy for a cause. To choose to engage in a physical activity that will improve their ability to access healthy nutritious food, by using their energy in a physical activity that will prevent overweight/obesity that lead to Non-Communicable Diseases (NCD). At the same time improve their access to nutritious healthy food using energy not their purchasing power.

This project intends to shift mind-set that it’s only through relaying on purchasing power (income) or government social grant welfare to access healthy food. The responsibility to access fresh nutritious vegetables lays on the individual to visualize and start an initiative in their community ecosystem to invest in food production projects in their communities to improve their individual and community health.

This project below highlights the stories of individuals who want to take on the responsibility to improve their own health by engaging in an energy for a cause project within their communities. By turning their neighbourhood waste dumping lands into community garden farms that will improve their access and availability of nutritious healthy food, also benefit the community and lighten the burden to the Health and Treasure department. How? 

“Let the be Community Gardens Farms” To assist the South African government fulfill its constitution obligation of “Every Citizen Has the right to food and nutrition” How?

By utilizing Energy 4 a Cause that will lead to impactful and self-sustaining community intervention project.

Let’s meet Sipho in his late 20’s he says; his never had a girlfriend or participated in any sport, at school he was an average achiever. In grade 8 I stated smoking weed (dagga) to lose weight and to boost my self-esteem. I’ve never had a formal job, after high school I survive by doing handy-man jobs in my neighbourhood and my dad supported me financially my entire life. 

My real problem is that my entire childhood I’ve been overweight, when my dad died I inherited some money, with that money I bought a VW mini-bus to use as scholar transport to earn money. For 3 years I’ve been working as a scholar transport driver, the problem now is that my childhood overweight has caused me to be obese in my late twenties, because of lack of physical activity and eating an unhealthy diet.

Now my condition it got worse when my mini-bus that I was using as a scholar transport to earn an income got stolen at my place during the night while I was sleeping this happened the past six months and the mini-bus hasn’t been found yet and I lost the only channel I had to earn some income.

Nowadays I spend most days sleeping, depressed and I lack energy to do any form of physical activity, also I consume large meal portions of unhealthy fatty, salty food and sugary drinks. I’ve become obese.

As a matter of urgency I seriously need to change and start eating healthy and living an active lifestyle. What can I do?

An idea come to Sipho to start using his neighbourhood vacant land turned waste dumping site four houses away from his place and his neighbours are forever complaining about the nasty choking smell coming from the illegal dumping site and no one in his neighbourhood seems to be doing something about it.

Sipho's 2 hectares waste land 4 a Cause

Sipho decides to do something, he decides to engage in an energy expense physical activity for a cause, turning the vacant land turned waste dumping site in his neigh bourhood into a community garden farm.

Currently his struggling to get support and the necessary resources needed to turn his neighbourhood waste land into a community garden farm. This idea can help Sipho discover a new purpose in his life and help him to have access to fresh organic vegetables.   
Also this project it’s an energy expense physical activity for a cause that can help Sipho lose weight, it can also help to improve the health and well-being of the community.   

We Also meet Dineo she says, she’s overweight and has high blood pressure. She has a friend in her early 30’s who experienced a stroke and she is disable on the left side of her body. I also fear that I might experience a stroke too, because I’m also overweight, have high blood pressure. We live unhealthy inactive lifestyle, we have kids and we are both unemployed and the only source of income we have is social grant from the government. We can only afford to eat an unhealthy diet which is high in fat, salt and sugar. Our diet is standard, no diversity and we eat less fruits and vegetables. What can we do to start eating healthy and living an active lifestyle?

Dineo sets out on a journey to change her unhealthy eating habits and physical inactivity, she decides to turn her neighbourhood vacant land turned waste land into a food garden. The only barrier that’s keeping her from starting her own community food garden is that she doesn’t have the resources needed to turn her neighbourhood waste land into a community garden farm. If she can have all the necessary resources and finance to turn the 2 hectare waste land into a food garden, she would be able to provide her family, friend and children with 4 different vegetable potions on their plates daily, as recommended by the South African Food Based Nutrition Guideline and be in a position to lower the risk of suffering from Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs).

Dineo's 2 hectares Waste land

This picture is of a 2 hectare waste land Dineo is struggling to get resources to turn into a community food garden, the waste land pictured will help Dineo introduce a community intervention project in her neighbourhood to address malnutrition, lifestyle diseases and physical inactivity. How? 

Through a 2 hectare land she would be able to at least provide her family and twenty different household in her community with 4 different vegetable portions on their plates 3 times a week to tackle malnutrition, ease the burden on income spent on food since people in the lower and lower middle income bracket spend almost 40% of their income on food and they don’t have surplus of income to spend on other household expenses like; life insurance, funeral cover or their children education plan. 

Please note that Energy 4 a Cause is a community intervention project that aim to tackle malnutrition, physical inactivity and prevent the prevalence of Non-Communicable Diseases in urban townships.

The South African National Government recognizes the fact that many people or residents in Urban Townships suffer from food poverty and they bear the brunt of the nation’s public health problems, and the government its cheap food policy is not the answer. Rather the key lies in poverty alleviation by raising income and directly addressing the problem of the lack of access and availability of healthy foods in Urban Townships and the lack of awareness of the SA Food Based Nutrition Guidelines. 

Even if the national government adequately addressed Absolute Poverty through social welfare, however relative poverty would still be a problem for public health. The problem with government focus on stimulating consumer demand for healthy food is not only that individual choices are more or less constrained, but that agriculture production and the supply of food are heavily insulated from consumer preferences.

The overall supply of bulk fats, salt and sugar that play a big part in making the nations diet unhealthy, depends on other factors besides consumer demand. If those ingredients continue to be over produced, beyond our collective capacity to consume them and remain healthy, the poorer people will eat them in excess and bear the health consequences.

By the time we decide which foods to buy, they have probably already passed along a complex production, processing and distribution chain. Our choices are therefore shaped and largely determined by the actors involved at these different stages. Actors who are only concern with adding value in food for profits not nutrition ingredients in processing to give new qualities. Little money can be made by selling fresh fruit and vegetables that form the mainstay of healthy eating advice. (Source: Food Ethics Council)

All that can be done to address diet related lifestyle diseases is to empower people with the capacity to choose to utilize their own energy 4 a cause. 

A channel that can improve their health, access and availability of nutritious fresh vegetables, through investing in impactful and self-sustaining community intervention project that aim to tackle malnutrition, physical inactivity and the prevalence of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) in Urban Townships.