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Advocacy/Community Engagement
A Growing Garden of Inclusion
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Bakgona
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Menzi
Region
Africa
Program
Eswatini
Project Year
2020
Bakgona and Menzi are Special Olympics Youth Leaders from Swaziland who will lead a Youth Innovation Project aiming to unify people with and without intellectual disabilities through a community garden.
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Together, Bakonga and Menzi will lead this agriculture project by training Youth Leaders in how to grow vegetables and researching markets in which to sell their products to make a profit and create a sustainable business. In doing this, Bakgona and Menzi hope to increase awareness of intellectual disabilities and highlight potential jobs for many youth in Swaziland.

Bakgona and Menzi were inspired to create this project because they noticed that there was a gap in job opportunities for youth overall, but specifically for people with intellectual disabilities. They hope that this project can set up many youth to cultivate their own vegetables and sustain a business where they are independent and can showcase their talent. By training Youth Leaders on how to grow and sustain their own agriculture business together, Bakgona and Menzi are inspiring the Unified Generation to showcase their talents and advocate for inclusion in everyday life.