2) Summarize the problem that was identified by this social entrepreneur.

Green fingers are not born but made, Beatrice Yong declares. With time and effort, and
through trial and error, anyone can be a gardener. Shao-Lyn Low and Beatrice Yong who are the
former from Sekolah Sri Cempaka schoolmates run social enterprise Eats, Shoots & Roots, a
unique outfit that offers products and services on permaculture and edible gardens to encourage
people to grow their own food.
Unlike conventional agriculture, no chemicals, pesticides or fertilisers are used. Instead, the soil
is enriched with compost made from organic materials. In short, we let Nature condition
nature, Beatrice explains.
There is no particular order to the types of greens that Eats plants in their garden, although the
focus is on perennial vegetables that is, crops that need to be planted just once but can be
harvested year after year.
Still, determining what will grow is often a process of trial and error. Not everything we plant
here does well, Beatrice reveals. If the conditions are suitable, the plants will naturally thrive.
True to permaculture practices, the aim is to mimic Nature as closely as possible and have a
diversity of crops. Plants that are meant to prosper within the same environment will form an
eco-system that is pretty much self-sustaining, thus requiring minimal care and even help keep
pests at bay.

Shao-Lyn (left) Low learned about permaculture through a friend and was drawn to the idea of living off the grid.
Beatrice Yong (right) left her job in advertising to pursue her passion for a green lifestyle.
Aloe vera grows alongside rosemary and coriander in The Herb Spiral (left). Four-angled beans that have hardened
as they were not harvested in time to maintain an edible garden requires meticulous attention (right).

Shao-Lyn designed the boxes, printed on recycled paper so theyre compostable and
biodegradable, which are meant to be re-used for storing the seeds you will collect from the
crops you grow. The duo made sure to include useful references such as illustrations of the crops,
details of the soil mix to use for potting, and best way to eat tips printed on the back of each
seed packet. We realised that we needed to have our own garden so we could practise what we
learned.
The workshops they were organising focused on permaculture on a fairly large scale and they
were designed for villages and towns and attracted mostly architects, landscape artists, organic,
slow food practitioners, and those who had grown weary of city living and were aiming for a
more bucolic life.