Mandela Day and Outreach Programme's Women’s Month activities
On Saturday, the 26th of August 2023, the Mandela Day and Outreach Programme participated in two events in commemoration of Women’s Month.
Throughout our work addressing the intersection of climate change and food security, we have found that women play a central role, in tree planting and tending to home-based and community gardens. They are active participants, ensuring community development, preservation of the environment which is key to economic development and better lives for their families and communities through the simple act of tree planting and food gardening activities, which the Mandela Day and Outreach Programme supports.
Afrika Tikkun held a seminar on Climate Change and Food Security at the Nelson Mandela Foundation (NMF) in partnership with the Mandela Day and Outreach Programme. While still commemorating Women's Month, this joint effort between NMF and Afrika Tikkun showcased a number of female keynote speakers who are passionate about food security, urban farming and agricultural processes and practices. Eighty young urban women members from Diepsloot, Alexandra, Orange Farm and inner-city Johannesburg, attended the event, all gearing up their advocacy plans for the upcoming annual 16 Days of Activism.
Simultaneously, Head of the Mandela Day and Outreach Programme, Gushwell Brooks, attended an event organized by the Northcliff Rotary Club, where one thousand three hundred hampers, consisting of essential goods for mothers and babies were packed and distributed to wowmen and children in need across Gauteng and other provinces of South Africa. The event was held at GEM Homes for Senior Citizens, in Franklin Roosevelt Park in Randburg.
At the event, the Northcliff Rotary Club pledged two hundred trees which will be planted in collaboration with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, in communities in dire need of greening, further bolstering the work of the Mandela Day and Outreach Programme’s campaign of planting as many trees as possible, 60% of which are fruit trees.