The Green Heritage Eco-Club of St Francis Xavier’s School, Siolim will be organising the ‘32nd Annual Festival of Plants and Flowers’ on August 24, 25 and 26. The theme of the festival is ‘Plant a Tree, Keep Goa Green’ and the sub-theme is ‘Micrograins in our Food’. The festival will be inaugurated on August 24 at 11 am by noted environmentalist Rajendra Kerkar, who will be the chief guest, and Allison Fernandes will be the guest of honour.
In 1992, visionaries like Alexyz Fenandes, late Joel D’souza, Dr Miguel Braganza, Lawry Fernandes, Francis Borges, Lumina and ex-teacher Robert D’Mello, organised the first plant festival in Siolim, which was handed over to St Francis Xavier’s School, Siolim in 1997 and this gave birth to the ‘Green Heritage Eco- club’.
Diogo Pinto, the founder of the Green Heritage Eco-Club and a science teacher at the school has been with the festival since the school took over the festival in 1997. He retired from teaching in March this year, after 34 years of service at SFX School, Siolim. Diogo worked tirelessly and was the inspiration for the last 31 years of the plant festival. However, he returned to the school for a pre-festival session to demonstrate the making of a seed bomb. “It was a great feeling to be back to the school. This time, not as an organiser but as a resource person at the workshop, interacting with the students and meeting my colleagues. SFX is like my second home,” says Diogo, who was accompanied by renowned horticulturist Miguel Braganza for the workshop.
There will be an exhibition of plants of various categories, display of art and craft, traditional artefacts made of bamboo, paintings etc. Around 25 schools will be participating in various competitions such as biodiversity of food producing plants, project competition, salad making competition, drawing competition and food preparation competition for students and PTA of the school.
Science teacher, Celine Rodrigues is currently heading the Green Heritage Eco-Club. The school organised workshops before the festival, to familiarise the students about plants and their importance, “In view of the festival, a pre event was organized by the Green Heritage Eco Club of SFX school on August 9, wherein demonstration were conducted on Mushroom cultivation by the resource person, Deepashree Naik of the Goa College of Agriculture, Ella Farm Old Goa. A demonstration on ‘Making Seed Bombs’ was also conducted on the same day, by Diogo Pinto and Minguel Braganza for all the invited schools of Bardez Taluka,” says Celine Rodrigues who is organised the event with Kenneth Lobo and the committee.
The school will organise various inter school competition in view of the festival based on the theme and the sub-theme. Various schools in and around Bardez Taluka participate in these competitions. “The school will organise a Food Competition in three categories, dry, wet and sweet dish for the students of SFX School. For students of Class 5 and 6, there will be Poster Making competition on the theme ‘Plant a tree, Keep Goa Green’. Students of Class 7 and 8 can participate in the Salad Making Competition using Micrograins. Students of Class 9 and 10 can participate in the Project Competition on Solanaceae Family while students of Class 11 and 12, can take part in the Project Competition on Micrograins. Reel making competition based on the theme ‘Plant a tree, Keep Goa Green’ is open for Classes 9, 10, 11 and 12,” informs Celine.
The festival showcases various varities of flora which are exhibited by the students of SFX School. Reputed plant nurseries will be putting up stalls and selling exotic plants, garden implements and organic manure. The festival will be open for the public on all three days from 9 am to 6 pm.