The intelligarden.

Reusable compact units that facilitate proper growth of necessary food crops like vegetables even in unfavorable growing areas so as to ensure accessibility to a balanced diet all year round.

A unit specifically designed to protect and ensure growth of crops that would otherwise not be grown in an area due to various factors like climatic conditions, soil conditions, space etc.

Each unit is compact and utilizes various intensive gardening techniques so as to grow more in less space.

Each unit also comes with specially prepared soil and well sorted seeds, this deals with plenty of issues like soil quality, tedious work put into preparing soils for planting, damaged seeds and soil-borne diseases.

 The planting tray/container is encased within 5 walls with one wall permanently attached to the front of the tray. The tray can then be pushed in and out of the case in case one needs to come into contact with the crops for whatever reason.

The roof of the unit acts as a water reservoir that slowly lets water through very tiny holes at its bottom to the soil below.

These walls offer protection from various physical threats to crops for example pests, weather conditions and external damage by animals and people as well as the roof which not only acts as a wall but also helps to automate the watering of crops, save water and time.

The intelligarden deals with the mordern day issues facing the old conventional gardens.

Land/space: With a fast growing population of over 47 million people and an average age of 15 years in Uganda today, possession of wide, viable land isn't exactly the norm and yet most people directly depend on what their gardens produce either for direct consumption or to sell in weekly markets.

Vulnerability to weather conditions: Most of the time, crops are planted and left at the mercy of the unpredictable weather and with climate change now taking its toll, this can have catastrophic effects as crops are wiped out leaving nothing for the owners to salvage.This often leads to food insecurity and later even famine as the growers leave all their eggs in one open basket.

Poor soil quality: Usually when starting conventional gardens, the soil you find is the one your stuck with, it may work for one crop but not the other. If the soil is not compatible with the crop type, one usually spends a lot to improve the soil conditions. Unfortunately, this option is not available for most people and they usually give up on growing all together.

Poor seed quality: Most times, over a quarter of seeds planted turn out to be damaged in one way or the other. This results into wastage of resources like water, space and time on dummy seeds which can be devastating for the grower as their expectations were higher than the resultant produce.

The intelligarden targets those who need to grow food but lack most of the requirements for conventional gardening especially nowadays people need to grow well performing crops even without most of the conventional requirements.

World wide, there are households with children and adults facing malnutrition and related diseases for lack of specific foods in their diets due to various external conditions including both climatic and soil conditions. A perfect example of this are the various refugee camps worldwide characterised by limited space and resources, poor quality soils and seeds, vulnerability to weather conditions etc. 

The units are designed to ensure proper growth of the plants they host through utilisation of various techniques and parts and vary in size to stay convenient to all.The units will ensure access to certain food crops that could not have been grown in the area in the first place, leading to a drop in malnutrition issues in various communities.

Other than that, the use of reusable space-effecient units that come with well prepared soils and seeds will ease the work load and save time for growers which can be used to attend to other duties for example millions of children in Africa today are unable to focus on academic work as they have to work in gardens to make ends meet for their families.

The intelligarden's design also protects crops from weather conditions and external damage which ensures the highest amount of yields possible which substantially reduces the chances of food shortage and nutritional issues.

I, personally coming from the Northern part of Uganda, an area being hit by most if not all problems reflected above, have seen and felt the effects of the various problems reflected above. I also part-took in online research so as to understand the related effects and problems being felt in other areas all over the globe.

It is getting harder and harder for people to grow food and yet most people especially in Africa, Uganda in particular rely directly on the foods grown in their gardens as a means of survival. This has resulted to widespread famines and more cases of chronic malnutrition in various areas around the continent.

I selected concept though am sure of the feasibility of the intelligarden and have the designs of the units but because financial support is required since the organisation requires registration and a means of identification. Financial support is also required to start testing the prototype.

The intelligarden utilises both modern and ancestral gardening techniques and technologies so as to solve modern day problems. From manufacturing the trays and cases to preparing and packaging soils and seeds, the intelligarden makes sure to incorporate technology so as to ease and boost crop growing.

In the next year, the plan would be to begin large scale production, with a minimum number of 1000  users by the end of the first year.

The initial goals are to first and foremost;

• Make high yield gardening both easily accessible and available and make the over demanding conventional gardening a thing of the past.

• Make high yield gardening less tedious and more convenient for the grower. 

• See a substantial reduction in the effects of problems discussed earlier in the solution overview.

To achieve these three, we will need to and will release high standard and easy to use intelligarden units while keeping them affordable simultaneously.

We plan to use customer feedback as the main measuring stick since the units are meant to ease their experience as well as statistical information collected from affected communities.

The barriers we face in the coming year would be mainly Financial as we need funds to build the product, officially register and break into the market.

As mentioned earlier in the overview, I come from an area that has seen all the worst problems imaginable, from climate to wars, the Northern part of Uganda has seen it all, hence the high rates of malnutrition among children, famines and wide spread food insecurity with in the area and I whole-heartedly believe the intelligarden will play a crucial role in curbing those problems and have a positive effect on people's lives and as youth, who better to solve the modern day problems than us.

None currently.