Community-grown vegetables for sale at Woodlands

Channel NewsAsia 5 Apr 14;

SINGAPORE: Residents in Sembawang GRC will be able to buy community-grown vegetables at a farmers' market on Sunday.

National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan said there will be some 250 kilogrammes of vegetables for sale at the market, which will be held at the Republic Polytechnic in Woodlands at 9am.

Proceeds will go to the Man Fut Tong Nursing Home.

The vegetables are harvested from community gardens in Woodlands, which were upgraded into "model vegetable gardens" with the help of the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority (AVA).

The community gardens are tended to by residents.

Writing in his blog "Housing Matters", Mr Khaw said those vegetable gardens have been showing astonishing results since he roped in AVA .

"Every 4 to 6 weeks, there is so much harvest that the residents have been able to share them with needy families," he wrote.

Mr Khaw said the little ones in his constituency are not left out.

Aspiring green thumbs from the PCF Kindergarten at Woodlands have also been growing their own vegetables and will hawk their harvests, which include Xiao Bai Cai, Nai Bai, Kang Kong and Bayam, on Sunday.

With the help from AVA officers, the pre-schoolers learn how to sow seeds in plastic cups, watch them grow into seedlings, before putting them out for outdoor planting.

Mr Khaw said this has allowed PCF teachers to conduct outdoor lessons on seedling transplant, fertilising, weeding and harvesting.

"We have successfully extended community gardening to the young to nurture a new generation of "green thumbs". Over the last two months, the children have been tending to their own 'Kinder-Garden'," he wrote.

- CNA/nd