Calgary / Lima, Peru (Rural Roots Canada) – The power of growing food to improve people’s lives is not lost on the community of Manchay, located on the outskirts of Lima, Peru. There, a gardening school has changed the fortunes of countless people, by empowering them to grow their own food and provide a source of good nutrition for their friends and neighbours.

This flourishing gardening program has connections to Alberta. The charitable trust that started the school belongs to the family of Calgarian Art Froehlich. His family, including his wife Shirley, daughter Lindsay, and son Robert, are all involved with the trust and over the years, they have contributed to numerous charities, including 4-H, the Mustard Seed, scholarships, colleges, universities and other forms of philanthropy.

Froehlich says after turning 50, he took a step back from the corporate world, and the family started looking for something that would allow them to leave a legacy internationally. A chance encounter with another philanthropist at a training seminar, who had been thinking about working in Peru, led them to consider focusing their future charity efforts in the South American country.

Froehlich visited the country a few times and felt there was something special about Peru and its people. During those visits, he says they conducted research and gathered information about the Manchay area, which lies in the hills just outside Lima.

“We asked, what were their needs? And their needs were everything. They needed housing, they needed education, they needed health care, they needed better nutrition,” Froehlich says.

He quickly realized that his background in agriculture and farming could do a lot to improve the nutrition of the people living there. Realizing the opportunity became even clearer when they saw the entrepreneurial spirit of Peruvian women. As an entrepreneur himself, Froehlich says that was appealing to him.

“The United Nations did a study a number of years ago, and the women in Peru were the third most entrepreneurial group of women in the world,” he notes. “I mean, these people are pure entrepreneurs. That’s how we settled on Peru.”

At this point, they set about looking for partners to help pull off this initiative. It led them to the creation of the gardening school, which has had an incredible impact.

“It’s been running for 11 years now, and we’ve had 700 graduates from the school, all women, and we focus on the indigenous community, the Quechua, in Peru.”

The foundation brought in an agronomist to train the graduates and provide support to the community. To date, the graduates have set up around 350 garden plots, providing food for their families and extra produce for the community, and they are well on their way to reaching their goal of 500 gardens in the area.

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On-going support

The six-month course is only the beginning of each graduate’s journey, thanks to the ongoing support from the foundation.

Froehlich, also the President, Owner and CEO of AgriView Inc., says they provide tools and support and drop irrigation equipment to help get them started. They can use the gray water in the area.

“All the water for all the potable water is trucked in, and it’s very expensive for them to buy it.”

Froehlich says they have also strived to use innovation, such as fog catchers, to help the locals get water. Fog catchers do exactly as the name suggests. They capture fog, which then turns into rain that flows down large nets into a containment unit. From there, the water is collected in drums and used to irrigate the crops and provide water for chickens and guinea pigs.

Froehlich knew these fog catchers would be a perfect fit for the work underway in Manchay. “We’re just launching that this year, we just put up our first four fog catchers,” he says.