Pupils at schools in Cameroon are growing vegetables and fruit with regenerative methods at a time of widespread hunger in the country, according to a Global Voices report. Organisers say the gardens build practical skills and add some nutrition. A researcher cited in the report warns that plots of this size cannot wipe out hunger by themselves.
Hunger in the background
Global Voices describes a decade-long humanitarian crisis that it says contributes to food insecurity in the Anglophone regions and the Far North. Earlier this year, the IFRC, the global Red Cross and Red Crescent federation, assessed nearly 6,000 Cameroonian households and concluded that hunger was getting worse. Global Voices also reports that over 3.3 million people had trouble getting enough to eat, and that about 64 percent of households experienced severe food insecurity.
The report adds that 29 percent of children under five suffer chronic malnutrition nationwide. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says hunger can weaken concentration and memory and reduce attendance. In February 2026 the FAO reported that just 2.8 percent of primary pupils in Cameroon were given a free hot meal at school.
Gardens in practice
At Blessed Bilingual Education Centre in Ebang, in the Centre Region, students gathered their first harvest of the 2026–2027 school year after sowing huckleberry in September. The school takes part in the Climate Change and Innovation Club, which Support Humanity Cameroon (SUHUCAM) launched in 2024. Its plots mix guava, soursop, orange and papaya trees with plantains, huckleberry, cabbage and waterleaf. According to Global Voices, two years and two garden cycles in, the SUHUCAM club has put more than 400 trees in the ground, and thousands of households have benefitted.
In Bamenda, the Youth Association for Climate Action runs the ADAPT Programme, involving 70 pupils drawn from a pair of nursery and primary schools. Around Nkambe, Yodo Cameroon's Smart School Gardens Project covers pupils at six primary schools and two secondary schools, which were given wheelbarrows, watering cans and compost manure.
Money is handled differently by each scheme. ADAPT sells produce on a market day and puts the takings into the next planting round. In Nkambe, sales have paid for items including chalk and exercise books.
Expert caution and obstacles
Nkimih Clinton, who works at the Institute of Agricultural Research for Development, says composting, mulching, crop rotation and organic manure can keep soil productive. He advises against expecting school plots to end hunger entirely, but says they can enrich diets with vegetables, legumes and fruit alongside staples that parents supply.
The report says coordinators find it hard to plan around erratic rain, and that shifting weather can bring pests and seed shortages. Keeping crops tended during school holidays is another problem, because pupils are less available to look after them then. Global Voices says schools need money, dependable water, tools, good seeds and technical advice.
Official programmes
According to the report, an FAO-backed school production programme in the East and South regions built 18 gardens in 2025. They yielded 236,859 kilogrammes of vegetables, plus eggs and fish, supporting weekly meals for 10,833 students. Under the National School Feeding Strategy for 2025–2030, officials hope to serve one million learners by 2030. In July 2026, the Ministry of Basic Education struck a EUR 3.6 million deal with the World Food Programme covering 2026–2029. Its aim is to widen school meals built on locally grown food across three regions: Adamawa, the East and the Far North.
Sources
- Global Voices (CC BY 3.0)
