Who we are

A student project, not an organisation

It started at Oshwal Academy in 2026, with a question we could not answer and a pile of bottles we could.

The name says what we are after. Balanced is the nutrition half — a plate with vegetables still on it. Bites is the size we work at, because that is the size a class can actually finish.

There are four of us, and between us we run the whole thing: the collections, the cutting, the planting, the talks and the follow-up visits. All of it points at one problem — malnutrition — and at the idea that a wall of bottles is a real answer to part of it.

Why we started

Why Balanced Bites?

Food is the one thing everybody needs every single day. It is also the first thing that runs short.

We recognised that malnutrition is a serious health issue in Nairobi's informal settlements, which inspired us to work on the possible solutions we could provide to help address it.

Around us, most people can find something to eat. Finding a balanced meal is the harder part. When money is tight the plate fills with whatever is cheapest, and vegetables and fruit are the first things to disappear from it.

Schools and children's homes feel this most. Many depend on produce that is bought in or donated, which means the vegetables arrive when somebody else can afford them. When a donation stops, so does the kale.

So we asked a smaller, more stubborn question: what if a place could grow part of its own food, in the space it already has — a wall, a corridor, a strip of concrete by the gate?

We could not fix the food system. But we could fill a bottle with soil.

Balanced Bites is what came out of that question. It is run by students, and it puts three things in the same basket: urban farming, nutrition education, and support for the communities near us.