Key people: Norman & Hilda Tonga
We didn't visit Chipata this year but met with Norman and Hilda at the Bright Hope World Partner Conference we held at GLO, Ndola.
Norman is very thankful for having the transport of the motor bike which has enabled him to travel the distances of up to 80km to meet with the newly planted churches. There are now 17 planted churches in all, which are doing well with their own leadership.
They now have 43 orphans on the program, with 15 orphans who have graduated over the years the program has been running. This has been great for a very poor area as 15 families now have at least one member who has an education.
Norman's own farming has gone very well this year and he has been selected for being a demonstration farmer in the area. His field is on the side of the main road and causes a lot of people to stop and look at the way he is farming. For maize this year he has harvested 18 oxen carts full of maize from 1.5 ha which is equal to about 7 ton per hectare. He also has 130 x 50kg bags of groundnuts.
The training went well and there were 8 new farmers trained this year, added to the 15 trained in the previous year. Each week from August to November the farmers come on Fridays to be trained in the principles. They were given inputs as loans and are now to repay with the yields from the harvest. The issues that they have is that the prices for produce has dropped up to 50% from last year as there have been bumper yields in the area, and the increased cost of fertilizer for top dressing has risen over 50% in the last two years (up to 350 ZMK per 50 kg bag). Norman showed us the yield data for the people trained and this showed that smaller fields done well produce better results.
Norman has a phrase “Let the field teach the people”. In the first year they laughed at him but they are no longer laughing as they see the results. People are starting to see that a small field done well produces more yield than a big field done badly.
People are saying that now we have enough mealy meal and within the church they are able to start to help even with the ministry of church planting.
They plan to run more training courses this year and may request some funds to help increase the inputs they need to buy to give out as loans to farmers.
They have also requested funds to buy a plot of land that could be set up as a demonstration center for Foundations for Farming. They would train people here and as part of the course fee the people would work for a day per week on the land. The income from the harvest on the land would be used as a top-up for the partnership programs.
1) Praise for the farmers taking hold of the Foundation for Farming principles
2) Pray that they can store and sell the produce at a higher price, and that all farmers will be able to repay the loans in kind.
Norman is doing really well with farming although still is growing in this partnership following Lonard's death. The accounts were well done with a notebook showing all the expenses and withdrawals from the bank. Receipts were also presented, other than a couple which they are still waiting to get from orphans who are away at secondary boarding school.
The orphans program budget is to remain the same for 2018. They may require additional funding for the extra inputs required for farming program and Norman will be in touch regarding this.