The 45-year-old Pakistani expat, who arrived in the country in 2000, had lost his job in 2022
uae18 hours ago
Starting from the early days of his childhood when he used to grow small soon-to-die plants in a Nido canister, Hussain Al Hosani unveiled the secrets of healing through farming.
After enrolling in an incubator programme that taught him all he needed to know about advanced farming technologies, the 41-year-old has come a long way since his school days. He now grows his entire household’s supply of fruits and vegetables in addition to commercially viable produce. He even infused farming with healing activities for patients at the National Rehabilitation Centre (NRC), where he works as patients' affairs officer.
“Mental rest that comes from farming can only be sensed by one who lives it,” he said while demonstrating professionally grown plants at his rented greenhouses in Abu Dhabi’s Gracia Farm.
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“Since I was a child, I was passionate about agriculture, but I didn’t know how to cultivate crops properly. In school they taught us to grow small plants in a container, I used empty canisters like the ones they sell Nido powdered milk in, but everything I planted died so quickly," he said.
“I wasn’t aware that plants are like humans, they require care and nutrition, such as vitamins.”
Over two decades later, Al Hosani decided to revisit his childhood hobby after moving to a new place in 2020, “I found that I finally had extra space, so I created a mini home-grown garden on the balcony outside my bedroom," he said.
While establishing his green balcony, he learnt through Instagram about Gracia Group’s incubator programme which helps Emiratis develop careers in agriculture; he joined them for a year and learned all he needed to know about agritechnology and how to be an independent farmer.
“Thanks to agritech you can grow anything in greenhouses regardless of the space, and it’s all automated, you just need to learn the basics and it is all done through a timer and seedlings.”
At his balcony’s 5 by 5sqm greenhouse, he grows spinach, iceberg lettuce, mint leaves, strawberries, rosemary and kale; “the balcony greenhouse kickstarted everything else.”
He built a green oasis at home with outdoor space, a green garden with flowers and fruits and a waterfall in the middle.
“I then decided to put my profound skills to work; I started a weekly horticultural therapy programme for the centre’s patients, and since a year and a half over 100 participants benefited from it."
He initiated an oasis and a greenhouse where patients can practice traditional farming and technologically advanced agriculture, under the name ‘Green City’. The centre’s green haven hosts workshops, healing sessions and proper cultivation which generated large amounts of produce, driving Al Hosani to innovate another related initiative ‘Hasad al Beit’ (home harvest) to distribute the produce to the patients’ families, and more than 200 NRC employees. The crops include cucumbers, lettuce, arugula and parsley.
“The healing effect is evident,” said Al Hosani, “when you see the joy they experience when they pick up the crops they planted and took care of for weeks, to later hand to their families.”
Al Hosani applies all the tech-farming techniques he learnt from the incubator programme at the larger greenhouses he rented in Gracia. He uses organic fertilisers and the hydroponic scheme which replaces soil with rock wool to provide more sufficient water retention and aeration for plant roots.
“In one piece of rock wool I can grow four cycles of produce,” he explained, "here I am growing snack cucumbers."
Starting next week, Al Hosani is turning the 8 by 32sqm greenhouses into a tourist destination. Gracia Farm visitors can pay an extra fee of Dh10 to take a tour and pick fruits and vegetables to take home.
Now a self-built entrepreneur, Al Hosani also began a foodstuff project where he sells his produce in pickled form under the label ‘Ghilal’ which translates to ‘blessings of the earth’ in Arabic. His future plans include selling poultry and eggs from the hens and birds he started raising at Gracia Farm.
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