GUNTUR: Thanks to the initiative of Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) officials, kitchen gardens were developed in Anganwadi centres to provide pesticide-free fresh vegetables, fruits and leafy vegetables to infants, children and pregnant women. While the prices of organic vegetables and fruits are skyrocketing, it has become difficult to buy them from market and supply them in Anganwadis, with a limited budget. Keeping this in mind, the Department of Women and Child Welfare introduced the initiative to develop kitchen gardens at Anganwadis.
There are 4,405 Anganwadi centres in the district. As many as 1,42,196 children below three years, 85,328 children of 3-5 years and 61,818 pregnant women are benefitted through these centres. In the centres with own buildings and free space, plants of various vegetables including carrot, tomato, bottle guard, mirchi, brinjal, lady’s finger, ridge guard etc., are being raised. Plant pots are provided to the centres with limited space and leafy vegetables including mint, roselle, curry leaves and spinach are being grown.
The wet waste produced at the Anganwadi centres are being used as manure for the plants. And also seeds are provided to the beneficiaries and required information on the plantation was given by the agriculture assistants from the local Rythu Bharosa Kendras. This helped the women and children during Covid-19 lockdown.
During the lockdown, the Anganwadi centres were closed and the food items to be supplied to the beneficiaries were stopped. With the help of the information given by the agriculture assistants, most of the women developed kitchen gardens in their own houses and saved the expenses incurred on vegetables during the lockdown.
ICDS project director Manoranjani said the project has been more successful in rural areas compared to urban areas due to inadequate space. There are about 250 Anganwadi centres under GMC limits. Most of them were set up in rented houses.
Uma Lakshmi, a worker at Anganwadi centre in SVK Colony in Guntur said, “We are running the centre from a rented house. As we don’t have enough space, the leafy vegetables grown in the pots are insufficient. With the vegetables raised in our centre, we are able to provide three meals per week and we are buying vegetables from the market for the remaining three days.”