First tree planting event, part of the campaign “Coolege Vitamine”, was organized on 12 December, in the school- kindergarten “Pas cu Pas”, beneficiary of the UNDP project, along with other 4 schools and kindergartens.

More than 100 children and academic staff participated at the event, by planting a small modern apple orchard kindly offered by Codru ST, with knowledge support from the Moldova Fruct Association. Children will be further involved in collective gardening and fruit harvesting activities.  

“Planting trees represents an innovative way of engaging with kids and their parents in our joint effort to promote fresh fruits consumption culture in our school and outside. All our staff and kids will have the possibility to jointly take care of the mini-orchard; kids in particular will have the possibility to see some elementary technological processes and observe how much it takes to have qualitative harvest”, noted Valentina Lungu, Director of the “Pas cu Pas” public school and kindergarten.

Starting with November 2016, more than 3500 children are receiving twice a week, freshly sliced and packaged apple snacks, as result of a crowdfunding campaign that raised funds from business entities and more than 120 international donors (www.picivoinici.md).

“Coolege Vitamine” aims to increase gradually the fresh fruit consumption by children and students in kindergartens and schools, covering at this pilot phase 5 schools and kindergartens in Chisinau that were selected on a competition basis.

The current initiative is part of the project "Innovative business development for local sustainable economic growth", funded by the Government of Norway and the UNDP and supported by the Government of the Republic of Moldova, which aims to promote innovation in small and medium enterprises’ sector, through the transfer and absorption of knowledge, technologies and communication between businesses. The project runs from 2014 to 2017.