Perpetuating an educational operation for children, focused on the link to nature

« For me, it is abundantly clear that this project falls directly in line with the flagship values of the Veolia Foundation.
It focuses on the education and learning of the children of the values of sustainable development and nature conservation. While it is indispensable for promoting projects for the protection of the marine world, giant turtles, whales, the icecap, etc., it is equally important, closer to home, to foster family cultures of the "garden" and healthy food, and even an understanding of water management. It is specifically this ambassadorial role that Le Jardin Voyageur plays. »

Gilles Treca

Since 1996, the nonprofit "Le Jardin Voyageur" has developed an activity of initiation into gardening and awareness of nature conservation, aimed at children.
This learning is through experience: see, touch, feel, try. The idea is to help them understand the natural balances and imbalances at the scale of a garden, in order to transpose this information (life cycles of plants, of the associated fauna, stresses, etc.) to our environment.

In 2008, the association ran 172 operations with school classes of the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, and 38 field trips to leisure time structures. Over and above a 900 m² learning garden, which it has installed in the heart of the Parc de la Deûle in the commune of Houplin Ancoisne, the association has also set up a hundred vegetable gardens in schoolyards and leisure centers of the region, which are kept up by the children themselves.

A recognized regional social mission

While this activity is obviously fun, it also pursues four major objectives. It first prepares the children for civil and moral life as future citizens, in their relation to the management of life.
It naturally teaches them about environmental issues (resources, balances, consumption). In their daily lives, it encourages them to be more friendly to flower beds, trees and shrubbery in the city.
And it also seeks to inculcate a certain balance.

And to perform its educational mission "Le Jardin Voyageur" relies on the childrens' imagination. It has created a character - Jardidier - and a traveling garden "La Brouette Pédagogique" (The Educational Wheelbarrow), mounted on a trailer and modeled on ... a giant wheelbarrow. This vehicle needs to be replaced today.
The association has therefore applied to the Veolia foundation, because this vehicle replacement means the perpetuation of association's underlying purpose, reflected by its name "Le Jardin Voyageur".