What if we told you that compost made from kitchen scraps is liquid gold for your garden and a clever way to save money on input costs? But you don’t have to take our word for it.
According to Babalwa Mpayipheli, a field worker at Abalimi bezekhaya garden in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, you should think twice before chucking your kitchen scraps away. Instead, you should consider using them to make your own compost.
In an interview with Health For Mzansi journalist, Vateka Halile, Mpayipheli explains using a technique known as “bokashi” composting. This is a traditional composting practice that uses bacteria to break down food scraps and garden waste.
Mpayipheli asks why not use your kitchen waste as compost for your very own garden at home? “We use compost piles of one meter in length and width for bi-gardens and community gardens.”
In the article, Mpayipheli offers a complete bokashi composting guide for home gardening, and notes that it may be used in confined spaces and prevents insects and odours.
Keeping it natural
If you can’t stand unpleasant odours, then the bokashi method might not be your thing. According to Gengezi Buba-Yuze from Mandalay in Cape Town, the bokashi method does not work for her because of the odour. Instead of doing this, she has decided to dig a hole in her garden.
“What I do is carry all of our kitchen scraps to the garden and cover it with topsoil.”
This has made her sandy garden more like the rich soil she is used to in the Eastern Cape. She adds that the presence of earthworms in her garden has made the soil fertile, which is beneficial for her garden.
“Earthworms are essential to the health of the soil because they bring nutrients and minerals from below to the surface through decomposed organic matter.”
Buba-Yuze says that her produce tastes better since she began preparing her own compost. She says that even neighbours who purchase tomatoes, spinach, and spring onions from her, relish the organic nature of the produce.
The article offers more advice on useful scraps to use for your garden and a breakdown of the bokashi composting method.
This article was written by Vateka Halile and originally published on Health for Mzansi.
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