Paying It Forward Video Segment: Kelleah Meuth
“I wanted to do something to teach the community, especially kids about health and nutrition and growing your own food.”
For 14-year-old Kelleah Meauth living a sustainable lifestyle is nothing new.
“I notice when people grow their own food they are much more likely to eat it and eat healthy," said Meuth.
The Buda teen wanted to share her knowledge of healthy and sustainable living with others.
“This started through 4-H. I’m doing something called the Globe Project where I’m learning about poverty and sustainability. I traveled to Heifer Ranch last summer. My assignment was to do a community service project.”
Kelleah’s community project evolved into the Buda Earth Festival. With help from the community, she organized the festival and held it at the Buda Farmers’ Market.
“I built an aquaponics system and I brought it here to show people that it is a super sustainable way of growing plants. Aquaponics is a growing way to raise plants and fish.”
From healthy recipes to plant potting, the festival showcased examples of sustainable and healthy living.
“People can learn about the benefits of and taste wild herbs that they can forage right here in Texas in this area, said Meuth. “Seed bombs are balls of compost and clay and flower seeds that you can just throw anywhere and they will grow wildflowers. This will help with pollination and they are all native to Texas. We have waste basketball which is a game where kids are sorting balls into the different baskets based on compost, trash, and recycling. They are learning about things that you can recycle or compost and things that have to go to the landfill. People are learning how to grow plants from their food scraps from avocado pits and the bottoms of lettuce or celery.”
Kelleah’s father is proud of his daughter’s passion and determination.
“She has always been somebody that has been interested in sustainability. I’m an herbalist and I have a natural health clinic. We have always taught them to eat healthy and to make good decisions about what they put in their body. It is some that she has taken to the next level,” said Michael Meuth.
Kelleah says one day she would like to run a business that somehow incorporates sustainability.
“I’m really interested in sustainability because there are so many things that we could be doing better. There is a lot hunger around the world. A lot of food actually gets wasted. There are places that don’t have a enough water. That’s why I’m interested sustainability. Next summer I’m going to travel to Costa Rica to learn about other cultures and how they do thing super sustainably there.”
