Food Security

Clean water and food security must go hand in hand in order to guarantee children have the ability to reach for their potential. In support of that philosophy, Save the Rain teaches a mandatory passive irrigation and sustainable agriculture class to the 5th and 6th graders at the primary school receiving the community rainwater harvesting projects. Using the school farm and learned permaculture design methods, a midday meal is generated for all the students. Using that landscape as a living classroom, they are taught a new way of harvesting rain, planting crops and working with and nurturing the land.

The Women’s Water Initiative mimics the education done at the primary school but it is done at the home / family level. The family is taught to create a garden that is designed with permaculture principles and is started with plants that will come to harvest at many different times throughout the year. This frees families from their dependency on a single crop and the threat of its failure. It diversifies not only the nutrients available to the family but to the earth as well.

One of the primary philosophies we follow in Save the Rain is that if we first give to the earth, She will give back to us 10 fold. As 80% of Tanzania is rural agricultural and most of the students will need to grow what they will eat in the future, our goal is to arm them with the knowledge that will keep food sources secure and hunger at bay.