Amal Al-Sibai

Saudi Gazette

It is catching on in cities like Los Angeles and Johannesburg, and with a bit of creativity, the love to nurture, and plentiful sunlight, Jeddah and Riyadh may be next. Planting a garden, growing your own food; it can boost your health, save you money, and re- connect you with nature, which in turn helps dissipate stress and get you more involved with your family.



Fast food and junk food are manufactured products that are far from what natural foods look or taste like. Junk foods are stripped of the health giving vitamins and minerals that an apple or a yellow squash or a tomato or spinach or cauliflower provides. When the manufactured products replaced real, natural foods in our diet, the results have been devastating. The incidence of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, and cancer, have risen drastically in recent years, and these illnesses are all related to diet and lifestyle.



As Ron Finley, a leader of the urban farming revolution, stated, “Food is the problem and the solution.”



How can we take the problem (food) causing our down spiraling-health and turn it into a solution (food again)?



The answer is to grow your own food.



Ron Finley and his volunteers take strips of land – it could be an empty, abandoned lot, the space of land on the street in front of a home, a backyard, or even a balcony and they convert these vacant spaces into beautiful, green gardens. They grow fruit trees, vegetable plants, herbs, and flowers. People who planted the seeds, nurtured the plants, watched them grow, and then picked the vegetables are more likely to eat these veggies. The garden not only supplies healthy, nutritious food for free, but sitting in it or simply gazing at it is in itself therapeutic.



Finley emphasizes how much money families can save when they have access to fresh, whole foods for free that they have grown themselves; he says, “Growing your own food is like printing your own money.”



“Kids who grow tomatoes will eat tomatoes. Kids who grow kale will eat kale. Kids plant the seeds, nurture the plant, and watch the plant grow,” Finley said.



You can’t grow a bag of potato chips.



It sounds like a romantic day dream to go outside and pick the lettuce, tomatoes, and green onions that you will chop in your kitchen, and squirt some lemon juice and olive oil over them to make a delicious, fresh salad.



It all sounds great, but where do you start? What type of soil do you need? Are the conditions in your backyard good for growing plants? How much water should you use? And what if you live in an apartment with only a tiny balcony? It all seems pretty overwhelming, and there is the looming fear that you will fail and that nothing will ever come of the seeds you tucked away in the soil.



Many people know how much value, beauty, and good health growing a garden could give, but they are still reluctant to start their own garden because of all the above obstacles, and more.



Although it may seem intimidating at first, it is actually quite simple to grow your own garden, whether you live in an apartment, house, or villa.



A school teacher, a woman with a dream to eradicate world hunger, Claire Reid, came up with a solution to make growing food as easy as 1, 2, 3.



She jumpstarted the project, Reel Gardening, and designed packages called ‘garden in a box’ which comes with all the supplies you will need and guides you through growing your own fruits and vegetables, even if you are like the rest of us: clueless!



Reel Gardening was designed to be the simple solution to gardening. It offers you a biodegradable color coded paper tape that encases organic fertilizer and seeds at the correct depth and distance apart from one another. All you have to do is make a small groove in the ground or soil in a large potting plant, and push the strip of paper tape in, up to the white line indicated on the tape.



Make sure the tape is secure and firmly held in the soil. Water daily in the beginning, and once the plant starts to germinate you only need to water every two or three days.



All the fuss is taken out of gardening by using the clearly printed illustrations on the paper tape itself which explains how to plant the strips. It makes gardening accessible to everyone. You don’t need to think about how deep and at what distance apart to put the seeds into the soil because the biodegradable paper already anchors the seeds at the correct depth and distance apart.



By first finding a place in your backyard or buying some plating pots and soil for your windowsill or balcony, and spending just five minutes to plant the paper strips, you will have days and months to enjoy your lovely garden and eat healthy, fresh food.



For people living in apartment buildings, plants that grow well in containers on a balcony or window ledge include tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, green onions, radishes, and beans. Herbs like parsley, cilantro, spinach, and mint not only do well in containers on a balcony, but they let out a splendid fragrance too.  Make sure you have a sunny spot to place your plants.



When selecting planting pots, choose containers made out of recycled plastic. Clay pots are not recommended because the clay absorbs water and will cause the plants to dry out faster.