After several interactions with key stakeholders (government and the private sector) for funding to implement NSNP, the KZN Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) has made available an amount of R3million for seed funding.
This effectively means that USCDA will in the future be hard at work mobilising people in rural areas, particularly women-owned cooperatives to engage in extensive cultivation with the sole aim of supplying the lucrative school nutrition programme. Over a short period of time, purchasing of vegetables from conventional markets will decrease on a sliding scale in favour of community projects scattered all over Ugu. This is in line with the target of at least 100 hectares of fallow fields in traditional areas converted into high value cultivated lands and the NSNP has been identified as a catalyst in providing a stable market for the purchase of produce from small scale agricultural enterprises and cooperatives. Seed funding from Cogta is highly appreciated and a word of gratitude goes to the Hon MEC Nomusa Dube and HoD Tubane.