As Women’s Month draws to a close, Mogale City’s Department of Integrated Environmental Management (DIEM) in partnership with GenderCC Southern Africa – Women for Climate Change held two training sessions for 20 local participants, mostly women, interested in farming and sewing.

The training sessions formed part of the municipality’s Climate Change Strategy Imperatives and GenderCC’s Grassroots Women’s Conservation Resilience and Adaptation Against Climate Change programme that was designed to improve the livelihoods of low-income families through skills development using affordable, accessible and clean energy technologies. 

The five-day sessions sought to promote climate change mitigation and adaptation techniques while at the same time promoting gender equality and equal opportunities.

The first two days of training, which took place on 16 and 17 August, were held at DIEM offices in Mogale City. This session saw 10 women learn practical skills in hotbags design and manufacturing. Skills acquired include fabric preparation, stitching and the use of a sewing machine. 

Hotbags, also called S’manga bags are energy saving bags made of polystyrene and can be used as coolers or heat retainers. Once a pot comes to a boil, it can be removed from the stove and placed inside the S’manga bag. The bag will seal in the heat at the same temperature for up to 8 hours so that whatever is inside the pot continues to cook saving you energy.

The second training session took place from 21 until 23 August at Sandile Primary School in Kagiso and focused on permaculture farming. This session introduced 10 participants to improved farming techniques such as garden design to harvest water and intercropping as a way of maximising produce. 

Both training sessions were based on business principles that strive to assist participants to improve their entrepreneurial skills.

Whilst DIEM is fostering such training to advance natural ways of managing the impacts of climate change, the empowerment of women who have always been vulnerable remains significant.