See, Sow and Taste 
- A Nordic-Baltic project for Faroese children

In 2024, the Nordic House in the Faroe Islands is collaborating with the Nordic Genetic Resource Center (Nordgen), the Nordic Council of Ministers Office in Lithuania, and the Botanic Garden in Reykjavík on the project, "See, Sow and Taste" – which involves sending learning materials about plants and biodiversity to institutions and schools, along with enough seeds and inspiration for planting corn and vegetables themselves.

Today, agriculture is, more than ever before, distant from the everyday lives of our children. Few live close to a farm, and even fewer help with sowing or harvesting crops that become food on our plates. No wonder it’s difficult for children, or anyone, to connect the pre-sliced bread in the supermarket or the grated carrots on the lunch buffet to something that originally comes from a seed in the ground.

In December 2023, the Nordic House sent information out to all kindergartens and schools in the Faroes and urged them to participate in the project. Registration closed before the deadline due to the great interest it garnered. Today, 21 institutions and schools from all over the Faroes are participating.

Apart from the learning that teachers in the schools and kindergartens are doing on their own, the project also offers two public demonstration sites accessible to anyone who wishes to know more about the project and to see various corn and vegetables sprout.

The public demonstration sites are outside the Nordic House in Tórshavn and the greenhouse in Sandavágur, on the island of Vágur. All are welcome during opening hours.

Unique to the Faroese project is that both public demonstration sites have experimented with Tampar and Sigur – two types of barley from the island of Koltur that are native to the Faroes. Other types of corn and vegetables are also planted from seeds sent to us by Nordgen, which administers the Arctic Seed Vault on Svalbard.

Purpose
With population growth, loss of biodiversity, climate change, the recent epidemic, and other societal or geopolitical challenges, the issue of food security will become increasingly important. These are immense global problems that affect us all. Still, our children will have to continue our generation’s efforts to take care of the planet in a way that it can continue to provide us with plants. Plants that all of humanity depend on for food, shelter, energy, animal feed, and medicines.

To understand how a seed turns into a plant and what it needs to grow is, therefore, essential knowledge for anyone, not least children.

With this in mind, NordGen has created educational packages targeting primary schools and pre-schools to inspire children to learn more about food and gardening by putting their hands in the soil – and in all seriousness, we hope this will be a fun and inspiring way to participate and learn.

Follow the project on Instagram @seesowtaste.