Key people:
Lemon & Grace Nkausu
Doris Nkausu
There are now 32 orphans (Grade 6 to Grade 12) remaining on the program with four having finished Grade 12. The plan is to see these ones through to Grade 12 although at this stage they are not sure how to help them after that. The ones who have finished are not currently doing anything. We discussed if they would do farming but they are saying they are not very motivated to do this.
They are considering if some sort of loan program could be set up to kick start the school leavers into some form of business.
Lemon is a smaller version of his former self, having lost weight through diet and light exercise to combat the problems he has been having with blood pressure. He seems much happier and healthier.
So far they have trained two groups who are doing a lot better with yields on their farms. They want to train another group this year who will be ones from outside the church so it will be an outreach. They still have the funds for inputs for the farming by way of the micro-loan program being repaid each year so this will carry on. Lemon will do the teaching.
Income Generation Activities for Orphans ProgramChickens
The chickens have not gone well. They had 40% of their layers die due to disease and the broilers had an issue with the local farm over producing and dumping a large number of chickens on the market for sale which reduced the price and made it unprofitable.
They aim to restart the layers in October now that they have completed the building for them (see photo) and they will be away from the broilers, hopefully to reduce the pressure of diseases.
Pigs
They have pigs again that look healthy. They put the funds from the chickens into the pigs, buying two sows and one bull. They have had a litter and will look to start selling soon. They feed them with one bag of feed (cost 145 ZMK) per week plus any house scraps. They want to use the funds they get from selling these pigs to restart the layers unit.
Alice TemboAlice was trained in the second group of farmers. She planted a plot about 1 lima in size and using the FfF methods has shown an improvement in yields. She says it has brought her joy and hope to see these improvements so now she can feed her family. She has six children to feed and look after. She goes to the same church as Lemon and Doris.
Before training she got on average three bags per lima planted but this year she got 22 bags from a lima (about 5 ton per ha equivalent). Praise God!!!
Ida was trained in the original first group. She explained the whole method to us from memory on the spot. This year she did half her field with compost and half with fertilizer. She didn’t know her total yields yet as they were still harvesting and shelling but she thinks it will be a great crop. She looks after three of her own children and one orphan in the family.
Mary was trained in the first group and this year she has an amazing looking crop of maize. In fact the community couldn’t believe how great her lima of maize looked.
She looks after her two grandchildren who have Sickle Cell disease and is a very faithful lady in the church and community.
Unbelievably one day she went out to start harvesting the field and suddenly just passed away. The community is in shock and asking the question, “Why would God bless someone who is so faithful with a great crop and then just take them away?”
We visited and prayed with one of her grandchildren Gregory (pictured).
These three girls came to talk with us about the orphans program and their lives. They are in Grade 10 and 11. They all speak great English and are well spoken young women. They all say they are so thankful for Patience Orphan Program otherwise there would be no education in their lives.
They attend school in town which means they have to travel each day by bus which costs 15 ZMK each day (US$1.50). They all live near Lemon's house and visit Lemon and Doris regularly. In fact Mary is the daughter of Joseph Kungwa who was in the very first intake of students at GLO Zambia when BHW's Field Director was the principal.
They find life can be a bit boring where they live with little in the way of recreation activities. They are able to play some football and netball at GLO.
All of them are saying they would like to become nurses when they finish school as that way they can help people.
They would like to purchase a hammer mill as a source of income generation. Lemon is going to do some homework and will present a budget. They would like a diesel one as all the mills in the area are electric but with the load shedding meaning power is only on for 8 hours each day there are many people wanting milling done.
They would also like to run another farming course.
1) Praise for Lemon's good health
2) Pray for the issues around what the orphans who have finished Grade 12 can do
It was good to see Lemon healthier and these guys still carrying on. We feel they are thinking in the right direction with farming etc.