About 290 schoolchildren receive Vitality Booster Porridge every day for 1 school year
Hamburg/Potchefstroom, March 08, 2021
Sustainability, energy production from natural resources and local added value – these are the goals that the Dirkshof team from Schleswig-Holstein around Dirk and Thoma Ketelsen have been pursuing for more than 30 years. In the meantime, the former organic farmer and initiator of wind energy extraction is successfully active in renewable energy projects worldwide. With the same goals, the non-profit organisation FEED – Food, Education, Energy and Development, founded in Hamburg/Germany and Pretoria/South Africa in 2020, is committed to the fight against malnutrition, access to education and the creation of new life and work prospects in South Africa. Now FEED was able to receive a five-figure donation from Dirkshof to support a primary school in a region particularly affected by the COVID 19 pandemic and poverty for a school year with vitamin-rich, mineral- and protein-rich porridge in addition to school lunches: Schoolchildren, their families and teachers receive a daily locally produced portion of the so-called Vitality Booster Porridge – often the only meal of the day – as well as training on balanced diet and its positive effect on health and the immune system.
Since 2020, FEED, together with its founding partner SUNfarming and with funds from the DEG/KfW Covid-19 Response Programme and other donations, has already distributed more than 2.6 million Vitality Porridge portions to schools. The medicinal herbs and other ingredients of the porridge are grown on local farms as well as in an agro-solar plant. Organically grown medicinal herbs are added to maize porridge, promote the natural functions of the immune system and are important for the healthy development of children. In sustainable agricultural production, FEED also supports the training of unemployed people with the help of donations from private and public donors, thus enabling them to take care of themselves and find new jobs.
"Dirkshof is happy to support where we know that the aid arrives 1:1 and that there is an immediate added value on site," explain Thoma and Dirk Ketelsen. "With its roots in agriculture, Dirkshof is naturally on the same wavelength with the philosophy of the school-food project in Africa. We are pleased that we could select and support the Nkagisang Elementary School directly and individually and hope to be able to visit it soon. Following the Dirkshof mission statement: Do something good and also like to give something away, talk about it and thus become a role model for other like-minded."
The German FEED e.V. was founded on the initiative of the North German entrepreneur and founder of SUNfarming GmbH, which has been active with agro-solar projects and training in Africa and especially South Africa since 2014. The donations from private individuals, companies, foundations and also the public sector are donated in Germany to the non-profit organisation FEED or to FEED South Africa, registered in South Africa, which organises the school lunch projects as well as certified agricultural training courses and further training programs for solar plant installers with local partners. The sustainable development aid projects, which are individually designed and comprehensively supported by the on-site team, are aimed primarily at women and young people who have become unemployed as a result of the pandemic in rural regions and townships, who have no access to education and often no perspective on life and development. The sustainability of the projects can be seen in numerous gardens, small farms as well as certified training participants and happy children, who can now concentrate better due to the balanced diet and become sick less often.
Contact:
F.E.E.D. e.V.
Edith Brasche, Senior Vice-President
Phone: +49 40 607 713 190
e.brasche@feed-ev.de
F.E.E.D. South Africa
Gustav Radloff, CEO
Cell: +27 (0) 83 44 11 094
Information about the donation company Dirkshof:
Sustainability, energy production and value creation – these have always been the focus points of Dirkshof. For 30 years, Dirkshof has been all about energy extraction from natural resources, mainly through wind turbines. Dirk Ketelsen, managing director and owner, is a man of the first hour, the initiator of wind energy in Germany – someone who does not want to attract much attention – who simply makes it. In recent decades, he has assembled a team of experienced specialists and specialists in wind power at Dirkshof, which with its know-how also acts as a source of ideas and impulses for the industry – in Germany and far beyond the European borders. The one-man pioneering company Dirkshof has become an internationally operating renewable energy company with more than 25 employees, which has already planned more than 700 turbines with a total of more than 2,000 MW of wind energy.
