8 schools in the Republic of Moldova have modern gardens with EU support

Thanks to the support of the European Union and the International Green Cross, 8 schools in the Republic of Moldova have modern gardens that provide children and youth with a healthy diet in canteens and  are an efficient tool for the development of their entrepreneurial skills. Oxentea Gymnasium, Dubasari district purchased a mini-tractor, Răscaieții Noi gymnasium, Ștefan-Vodă district and Caracușenii Vechi High School in Briceni district – each purchased a cultivator. All these had improved the tillage and loosening of the soil for a prodigious planting in school gardens.

It is already the third year of the EU4Youth – ”School Garden” for Agricultural Entrepreneurship ” project when spring begins with a new season of planting seedlings, seeds, tillage to give birth to a new garden and new lots of fruits and vegetables.

It is to mention that seven of the eight existing school gardens were created on a non-agricultural, unprocessed land, so the purchase of specific equipment facilitated the students’ work, as well as the harvest results. The soil is permanently cultivated, depending on the needs and those to be planted, and students also have the opportunity to study how an agricultural equipment works for the development of a modern garden.

The seedlings for vegetables or flowers were purchased from special stores or were grown and prepared by students. Oxentea Gymnasium has built a small greenhouse for seedlings cultivating, which gives sustainability to the project, as students already have planted the seeds, and in March the school has enough seedlings to start planting tomatoes and cucumbers.

In the School Garden’s institutions, where the main activity is growing bacilli, the month of March started with protecting the plantation from early spring frosts, and after this period, the students cleaned the plantation, raked, loosened the soil and created the necessary conditions for plant growth. In the school gardens at Răscăieți and Rîșcova, pupils built insect hotels to keep plant pests away.

The month of May is marked by the harvesting of radish in Oxentea gymnasium, the planting of strawberries in pots in Vadul-Rascov, Soldanesti, the growing of leaf vegetables in the Centre of Excellence in Horticulture and Agricultural Technologies in Țaul.

Around 200 students, teachers and support staff from all 8 educational institutions have been involved in the activities of the “School Garden” project, funded by the European Union.