When you plant a tree, you also provide shade for future generations. When you start a vegetable garden in your backyard, you provide your family with healthy meals. This is what the Member of the Mayoral Committee for Community Development in the City of Johannesburg, Cllr Ronald Harris, did this week during International Mandela Day at two of City of Johannesburg’s events.

“By planting trees, we’re creating windbreakers, mitigating against soil degradation and planting food for our families,” said MMC Harris.

The first event was with the Executive Mayor at the A Re Sebetseng event at Rose Avenue Park in Lenasia with a call to action focusing on getting the basics right. Community Development Department and its entities, which include City Parks and Zoo, Sport and Recreation, Libraries and Information and Joburg Theatres, supported the initiative.

MMC Harris spoke about the importance of safety in open spaces, “Rose Park is one of the few parks dedicated to special needs children which contributes to the Executive Mayor’s seventh priority of inclusivity.

“Open spaces are areas which people can use to relax, clear the mind, exercise, breathe deeply and bond with family and friends. The critical issue is of safety in the parks. We lost a young boy, Khayalethu Magadla who fell down a manhole last month. The incident speaks to one of the challenges we are facing as the City of Joburg, and we are working towards making every park and open space safe for our children and the communities. A Re Sebetseng is evidence that we can work together as the City to deal with the death blows to the social ills around us.”

The second part of MMC Harris International Mandela Day commemoration was at Nkanyezi Stimulation Centre in Orlando West where Joburg City Parks and Zoo prepared a vegetable garden for harvest season, planted fruit trees, cleaned the yard and painted around the park.

Marks Sethaelo, Acting MD for Joburg City Parks and Zoo, said their Mandela Day initiative emphasised on food security and food sustainability, “the main thing is building a city where no one goes hungry. No one should go to bed hungry”.

MMC Harris praised Joburg City Parks and Zoo for the quick response towards the late ANC deputy general secretary Jessie Duarte’s burial. “I take off my hat to you for the sterling and responsiveness you have in ministering to the needs of the people of Johannesburg.”

“The late Nelson Mandela once said: ‘It always seems impossible, until it is done’, and I think the Nkanyezi community has seen this today. Let us not get tired of doing good and let us never forget about the more vulnerable members of our communities. Sixty-seven minutes are just over an hour long, but it is long enough to make a difference in someone else’s life.”