Schoolchildren bag extra cash from carriers

Sunday 02 October 2016

A Jamie Oliver project to get children eating better in Jersey is one of 12 projects across the Channel Islands to bag extra some cash from forgetful shoppers.

Caring Cooks of Jersey's Kitchen Garden Project has been given £1,500 to help the scheme grow, thanks to all the money raised by the sale of carrier bags at the Co-op.

The charity is taking on a Food and Nutrition Coordinator to work in three of the Island’s primary schools next year teaching children where their food comes from.

It's the first time the celebrity chef's Kitchen Garden Project has been set up in Jersey and the charity's plan is to give over 10% of the Island's primary schoolchildren around 25 hours of food education during the school year.

The charity's founder Melissa Nobrega said: "The primary school children of today play a big part in the future of the Island, and we want to support them in achieving their full potential, through having a positive and open attitude towards food.

"The Kitchen Garden Project will equip them with some of life’s most important skills, growing food from seed and preparing simple meals with the produce, and we are incredibly grateful to the Eco Fund for supporting us to do this with schools in Jersey."

The Society started levying a 5p a bag charge for their Eco-Fund back in 2008 and this year they are dishing out more than £22,000 from the Fund amongst a dozen environmental projects in the Channel Islands.

The Society’s Membership and Community Manager Katey White said: "In the first year, we saw a 95% reduction in carrier bag numbers but we accepted that there will always be a small demand and so we wanted to offset that by using the profit from the sale of those bags to help environmental projects.

"Each year, we are genuinely amazed at the dedication shown by islanders to improve, enhance and enjoy our surroundings and once again The Co-operative Eco-Fund will benefit hundreds of people of all ages across the Channel Islands."

‘I have no doubt that the five projects in Jersey and seven in Guernsey will make a real difference to the environment that we are so lucky to have around us.’

In Jersey, the Kitchen Garden Project has received £1,500 to continue to support existing schools within the project and allow three new schools to get involved. Melissa Nobrega, founder of Caring Cooks of Jersey, said the funding would help give children important skills when it came to food.

The primary school children of today play a big part in the future of the Island, and we want to support them in achieving their full potential, through having a positive and open attitude towards food. The Kitchen Garden Project will equip them with some of life’s most important skills, growing food from seed and preparing simple meals with the produce, and we are incredibly grateful to the Eco Fund for supporting us to do this with schools in Jersey."

Also in Jersey, the marine biology section of Société Jersiaise will use £3,000 it received to fund its curriculum-linked marine education programme, which will be rolled out in each of the parish schools from September, while the Bats Are Go Schools Project has received £2,000 to ‘switch children on’ to the new Jersey National Park. The money will be used to create a short film for use by schools, explaining why bats are important to the island. It will also be used to fund competitions and bat kits for schools to build and locate bat boxes in their grounds and in the national park.