At Ma’O Farms, Leeward Students Learn To Grow Organic Vegetables, Manage Money And
Work With Others, All While Earning A Degree
A robust Kale plants spreads its thick, curly leaves in the Lulalei Valley, bracing for another hot day on the farm. To be a vegetable at Ma'O Organic Farms is to be king of the crops for sure, but those human caretakers have so many plans, and they never stop talking about them.
Sprouting from an idea, the farm has grown from a small plot of rocky ground to a 16-acre nonprofit farm project with customers and clients islandwide. The Mala ‘Ai ‘Opio ("youth food garden") Community Food Security Initiative is now a model for Hawaii’s sustainability movement, and its time has come.
It starts every morning down in the dirt. At dawn they come, these young farm workers, fresh out of high school; marching in rubber boots or trundling along on a John Deere gator - the rural man’s golf cart. Together teens and adults break the peace as they weed, water, laugh and talk about market deliveries, homework, whatevers.
For the full Mid Week Story, please visit: http://www.midweek.com/content/story/theweekend_coverstory/gary_kukui_maunakea_forth/