Environmental Awareness--Using Non-Formal Education to Impart Skills and Knowledge to Improve Crop Yield: The Case of Manyeledi Community, South Africa

This article sheds light on how non-formal education was used as a tool to provide knowledge and skills for Manyeledi community members who are engaged in subsistence farming, to improve their crop yield. Manyeledi is a rural village in the North-West province, which, like most rural areas, is experiencing environmental degradation caused by the depletion of natural resources, and poor farming practices. The environmental challenges experienced by this community include among others, the less arable land, changing climatic conditions and poor rainfall. A growing number of Manyeledi households live in abject poverty, where subsistence agriculture is the only source of livelihood. The community lacks the advanced farming skills needed to deal with the arid land and an acid soil. The paper provides insight into a community engagement project spearheaded by Bokamoso Impact Investment (BII), a non-governmental organisation that works to increase the crop production of marginalised groups. Through the above project, the environmental awareness campaign was launched to impart skills and knowledge that helped the Manyeledi community to deal with the environmental challenges. The training which the project members received through Non-formal education developed a heightened sense of awareness, of the need to improve their farming methods in order to enhance their livelihood sustainability. The study was qualitative in nature and observation and a one-on-one and focus group interviews were employed to collect data. The finding was that the skills and knowledge imparted by the NGO and the University of South Africa, improved the community's farming methods, which boosted crop production.