Educate & Regenerate is a new Star Seed Series about empowering the voice of the Regeneration.
I’m Grace, a 20 year old student from Oxford University who whole-heartedly believes in enacting positive, regenerative change for people and the planet. This week I have been doing an internship with Star Seed to learn about their Regenerative mission. Like many other people, I find it is all too easy to get swept into the fear-mongering, negativity, and panic resulting from the treatment of our earth by large corporations. I often found that this resulted in such severe anxiety that I would feel paralysed from making any real change. Taking back power and contributing in any way possible to positive change is something I feel very strongly about. Anyone is capable of making a difference.
Making an impact can begin with ourselves by regenerating our bodies, mindsets and the environment we surround ourselves with. Our bodies are reflections of our natural environment. As our planet degrades, so do we. It is therefore absolutely crucial that we work to regenerate our earth, simultaneously and consequently healing our bodies.
Photographer: Ana Torres, at 42 Acres for Primal Gathering where we visited a very old Mother Oak Tree.
At Star Seed, we truly believe in giving back to the planet. Our products are made from plants which are foraged by local communities in Kenya, working with the earth’s natural cycles. Through this process we hope to encourage the rejuvenation of ancient medicinal healing techniques by harnessing the power of indigenous plants and wisdom, reconnecting humans with their natural environment.
This relationship is reciprocal and symbiotic; we must not exploit the natural resources offered to us. Instead, we must respect our surroundings, and work to maintain the sacred balance between what we take and what we give, aiming to restore the harmonious relationship between human and earth that native communities teach us. It is important that when we forage and utilise native plants, we also give back, planting the roots for future generations to share in the same exchange.
We have recently undertaken a new project, Kilifi Fruit Forests: Empowering Education with 12 schools in Kilifi Kenya to do exactly this. Working with our partners the LEAF, these school communities are increasing their environmental awareness, with the hope of producing and securing their own food supplies. Many children are unable to attend school due to inadequate food supplies, so the potential of this project is immense.
We purchased 460 fruit trees and 42 saplings, which were planted by members of the school communities between the 22nd and the 25th of May. These fruit forests on school sites intertwine education with physical nourishment, providing an element of stability in the students’ lives. 120 of the fruit trees purchased were passion fruit trees, which powerfully demonstrate the positive potential of their growth. As well as providing food for students (passion fruits have a high nutritional value), the seeds of the fruits that are often overseen and thrown away, can be up-cycled for use in skincare products, re-connecting costumers with indigenous medicinal uses of these marvellous fruit trees.
Workshops led by the LEAF throughout the planting process educated the communities on the maintenance of their fruit trees, facilitating the development of a stable food supply for the current student-body, and those in the future. Since planting, there has been a 98% survival rate of the fruit trees, demonstrating the commitment of the community to their care. These trees represent a hopeful future for the area, encouraging both the planet and people to flourish. The fruit trees are also 100% indigenous species, regenerating ancient knowledge about their care and uses, whilst also encouraging biodiversity in the area. The benefits of the fruit forests cannot be overstated; the positive benefits extend beyond the direct school community, strengthening local ecosystems which can support and enable others to thrive, and demonstrating the success of such projects to others.
Click on the image to see our Explorer.land page and read more about our regeneration projects.
Helping native plant species to flourish is intrinsic within our philosophy at Star Seed, and we aim to do as much as possible to regenerate the earth from which we can gain so much. We believe that a key aspect of this is bringing transparency to our business. A large part of regeneration is allowing conscious consumers to trace where our products come from and the work we are doing to aid regeneration in local communities. By visiting our Explorer.Land site page, our customers are able to experience the work we are doing in real-time, and the positive change purchases are enabling. Making tangible difference and aiding real change is crucial to restoring the timeless relationship between humans and the earth.