A fellow volunteer, DouDou Kalala, is working in the community of August Town. I previously visited this area with DouDou and did a bit of work for them by way of an article.   DouDou has achieved some major successes in this community just east of the University of West Indies. For example, they recently installed a “suspended wall garden”, called African Gardens, which will bear vegetables such as pak choi, peppers, corn and tomatoes.

“I thought this initiative could benefit the community, because they are also growing their own food, and I think that is important,” Kalala told the Jamaica Observer (read the article here). His colleague, Michael-Edward James, also told the Observer: “We want to build on the social capital in the community by helping to reduce crime and violence. The main reason for this is to help the community to build within. We believe this will help the community a lot, because the community is currently trying to find ways to reduce some of the plastic material which cause pollution.”

It is a pleasure to see what can happen when the energy of us volunteers successfully merges with that of the communities in which we are working. Positive, sustainable and concrete outcomes such as this are what Cuso is all about. Congratulations DouDou!