The Wikke

The Wikke is the horticultural project of Wonen en Werken. Organic vegetables are grown there. The vegetables are mainly used to compose their weekly vegetable packages for their customers. The Wikke farms at the Benedictushoeve in Herent and the Abbey of ‘t Park in Heverlee. The farm employs both contracted workers and volunteers in their work care project. The vegetables are sold through the Abbey shop at the Abbey of ’t Park in Heverlee.

The Wikke is a unique social project. About twenty people engage in organic horticulture under supervision: both workers with permanent contracts and volunteers in the work care project. The Wikke is therefore more than a field where organic vegetables are cultivated. The employment project of Wikke is mainly about people, each with their own story. Vegetables are the common thread throughout this story. The work care project is about inclusion: the participation and belonging of extremely vulnerable people. Everyone contributes in their own way to life on the farm: fieldwork, weighing the vegetables and fruit, packaging, making compost, weeding, helping with planting and harvesting. This also means belonging, receiving appreciation, doing something useful and meaningful, being accepted, not being excluded, forming friendships, learning to make one’s own choices, feeling good… One can work at one's own pace at The Wikke and the result is there: delicious organic vegetables that you can’t resist.

This is a location with GUTS!

A location with GUTS* is a place where work around goods or services with GUTS* is central and where these goods are sold, exchanged, repaired, exhibited, and highlighted. It is a location that thinks and acts daily and sustainably locally, ecologically, and fairly. An initiative of fair community. 

Herent - Faire Gemeente