Uthando South Africa, the NPO bringing hope to Khayelitsha by leading with love

Tourism can be an extractive industry, especially for the communities on the periphery of the main attraction sites. Social entrepreneur James Fernie has found a way to provide maximum benefit to those who need assistance the most, while also serving tourists with an authentic experience. He runs Uthando (Love), a non-profit organisation aimed at community development.

It is Tuesday, 17 September 2025, and in Claremont, Cape Town, Fernie is putting on his wireless headset and microphone, as he sits in the driver’s seat of a 16-seater minibus. He weaves through Claremont, kwaLanga, Khayelitsha and the areas in between, sharing the historical context of these townships, explaining the socio-economic status and interesting facts. 

One may think this is a township tour. But, no, this is a well-curated tour of hope that visits some of the most inspiring people making an impact in helping people put food on their tables. One of the stops of the day is at Moya We Khaya community garden in Khayelitsha. 

The garden is the head of multiple small-scale farms that Mama Christina Kaba helped start in Khayelitsha.

Uthando (Love) South Africa is helping her fundraise to make this facility an agrihub that will bring upliftment and empowerment within Khayelitsha’s urban farming movement.

“This facility will create jobs, will foster the upward economic mobility of urban farmers in Khayelitsha and will provide essential services to improve and strengthen the supply chain of veg to markets and businesses around Cape Town,” says Fernie.

Kaba shares her story. “I ended school in Standard 2, but it didn’t matter because I could farm and was able to understand the soil. My dream of buying a car before my father died came true because of farming. Now I don’t want to die before the park shed is built right there,” Kaba says, as she points to the empty field next to the small-scale farm, where she hopes to build the agrihub.

Kaba has had a long journey teaching farming through Abalimi Bezekhaya, another non-profit, which is responsible for training hundreds of small-scale farmers through its multiple teaching programmes, often collaborating with funders and other agri and food justice movements. She is one of the pillars of the community. Even the plot she has now took years to fight for, before she finally received it in 2014. 

The soil on this land is beach sand, which makes it hard to cultivate. As a result, Mama Kaba has become an expert in making unsuitable land fertile. She says they dig trenches and fill them up with food, compost and manure in multiple layers to make sure the soil is nutritious and dense enough to retain water.

“As you can see our vegetables are very green and healthy now, we have the healthiest soil.”

The centre helps feed the surrounding community and creates an income for the 10 ladies who head the project, as well as additional learners and supplementary staff.

The agrihub

Social entrepreneurs have found a way to amplify the impact of tourism on grassroots organisations addressing food security, education and youth development in Cape Town.

Fernie, through Uthando, has helped build an early childhood development centre in an environmentally savvy manner, upcycling tyres, construction rubble and eco-bricks made from trash stuffed in plastic bottles. Fernie believes that building the agrihub using the same methods will have a great impact on the community and the young people who will be trained to use this building model.

“We have a vision around South Africa being a leader and pioneer in sustainable buildings created out of tyres, plastic bottles, glass bottles, polystyrene foam waste bricks,” he says.

“The building will be made with around 10,000 tyres on that site next to Mama Christina’s garden. It’s not just about a building. It’s about the ripple effect that it can have in that community. First of all, the building is extremely labour-intensive. So, it creates local jobs. Once people have trained up in that building modality, why can they not actually go on to build their own houses? Much better than a shack,” Fernie says.

“I mean, if you look at the quality of what you saw today; it’s fire-resistant, it’s strong, and the temperature regulation is amazing. So, what’s to stop us? Once people have learned that building modality is creating other structures,” he adds.

While Uthando works towards this major project, it is also making an impact with its tours. 

Kaba says: “We love James. Thank you guys for visiting because every time you visit, we get a R1,000 or R2,000 or more that helps us buy seeds, equipment and other things we need to keep going.”

The tour also stops at a house of three ladies who are budding entrepreneurs – 71-year-old Zani Sonders, along with her partners Thobeka Manjezi (69) and Nokupha Kotelana (71).

They sell stylish shopping bags made from upcycled clothing materials. They recently learnt to sew in a two-month programme under Uthando.

“The pension would get finished on food; the city charges a lot for electricity and other costs. We made it work, but now after the sewing training and beginning with these bags we have an extra income,” Sonders says.

“I didn’t think I would be starting a new opportunity at this age. We are still thinking about how we will make sure we don’t lose our pensions because business is up and down so R2,000 makes a difference but we are ready to take this project forward.” 

Fernie says he is inspired by the organisations he takes his clients to visit, and that informs the work he does despite challenges such as a lack of funding in the civil society space and worsening poverty and socio-economic challenges.

“It’s all about collaboration, and in the times ahead collaboration is going to be key; and I do feel there’s an urgency to mobilising grassroots if you look around the world right now,” he says. DM