Busy Bees Gilles Plains and Tamworth to benefit from Woolworths Jnr Landcare grant

Busy Bees at Gilles Plains (South Australia) and Busy Bees at Tamworth (New South Wales)have each been awarded a Woolworths Junior Landcare Grant.

 

The popular initiative offers funding for Australian primary schools and early learning centres seeking to inspire the next generation of environmental champions.

 

“Our project aims to grow and maintain an edible garden to teach children about sustainable food production and where our food comes from.” Anant Sohi, Service Manager of Busy Bees at Gilles Plains explained.

 

The service received a total of $1,000 that will be used to build new garden beds, plant seeds and maintain the new edible garden. Since the win the services’ outdoor area has become a hive of excitement with the children eager to help set up the garden beds. 

 

Surangi Fernando, Sustainability Leader at Gilles Plains said teaching children about sustainability from a young age through hands-on experiences helps them to grasp an understanding of what is happening and how they can positively affect the world around them. 

 

This, she continued, is how they become socially aware and show respect to the environment. 

 

The children and educators in Tamworth also received funding for garden beds, which they will use to plant flowers and vegetables. The remaining funds from the $1000 the service received will be used for a composting system with a worm farm.

 

“We hope to demonstrate with hands-on practice the cycle of growing plants, composting and returning the scraps to fertilise our gardens.” Stephanie Byrnes, Service Manager of Busy Bees at Tamworth outlined.

 

“Our Educators love coming up with new projects to involve the children in different experiences. This most recent project, now supported by the Woolworths Junior Landcare Grant, will also have the children out in the community as they go on excursions to shop for the worm farm, compost and native plants,” she added. 

 

“It is important to us to instil all of this knowledge of the environment for our children to be able to have a positive impact on their world,” Jade Walters, Educational Leader at Busy Bees at Tamworth added.

 

Each Busy Bees Service has created its own Busy Bees Environmental Commitment Statement to ensure that, as a whole, Busy Bees is working toward providing a cleaner and healthier future for all of its stakeholders while supporting sustainability. To find out more about how Busy Bees supports the environment please see here.