Ingrid Maredi’s vision of securing food self-sufficiency for her community in Alexandra is now paying off handsomely.
Vegetables from her extensive garden at the non-profit organisation, Ratang Bana which she founded, comprises spinach varieties and herbs, beetroot, carrots, onions, tomatoes, potatoes, cabbages and chomolia (a cabbage-like vegetable) are feeding a growing number of child-headed households and the community she lives in.
Every day, loads and loads of surplus vegetables are distributed to the child-headed households and community after she has taken care of her first love – orphaned and vulnerable children and gogos to whom she provides meals on a daily basis.
Ratang Bana provides daily meals for close to 300 children and the elderly.
Maredi’s selflessness has attracted Woodmead-based global company, Systems Applications Products (SAP), to enter into a long-term relationship with Ratang Bana to ensure the garden is sustained and continues to nourish the people in need.
In partnership with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, SAP Africa employees left their air-conditioned offices to endure the blistering sun as they volunteered their time to harvest the vegetables and then prepared the beds to plant new seedlings. The employees also cleaned the yard and spruced up the organisation’s library with some paint.
Sunil Geness of SAP Africa said the company would also make an assessment of the organisation’s IT centre which they would then upgrade in the medium term.
“Our presence here is not a once-off but the beginning of a long-term relationship with Ratang Bana, which we find truly inspirational for the work the organisation was doing within the community,” said Geness.
“We want to fortify what we have done by developing a long-term relationship with Ingrid and her selfless work.”
For her part, Maredi said she was humbled by the presence of SAP and wished her visitors could be showered with blessings from the Almighty.
“We’re a self-funding organisation from our meagre resources, and help such as this from SAP is more than welcome,” Maredi added.
Details: Sunil Geness 011 235 6000.
