Project Namana has shifted from Antananarivo to Southern Madagascar in Ambovombe where there is a pioneering team. They are there to reach out into the communities with the Good News to the Ntandroy people living in remote villages. Currently they are working in 21 villages and the message is spreading.
There are three major components to the community transformation. The Good News of Jesus, economic empowerment and farming, and adult literacy. Farming is important as they are farmers and have access to land but they are very poor so they are provided with seeds, training and small business skills, and have access to loans to improve their incomes.
Unfortunately the results of farming have been disappointing. There have been a series of droughts in the area for the past two years and crops have failed entirely. However, income is increasing for those who are applying the principles they are taught. The increase in literacy is also helping.
Loan: US$120 for seed and fertilizer
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Tanantsoa is a small village with 70 families (approximately 1,000 people) in the Androy region of Southern Madagascar. This is one of the villages where a new community of believers was started a year ago.
Like most places in Androy, drought frequently hits the area which causes famine and because of this people do not even bother to take the risk to farm again for fear of losing their crops.
When the Gospel was preached in this village, one young lady showed a real passion for God and a compassion for her people. Sinory is only 18 years old (centre in picture). She got married at the age of 14 but her husband left her when she gave her life to Jesus. She is leading the fellowship of believers in her village and despite her young age she seems very influential and is changing people's fatalistic mindset to have hope in God.
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Sinory, along with her ten fellow believers, has decided to farm again. In the past they used to do some ancestor rituals and offer sacrifices to the spirits before the start of the season. This time, now the 'Light' has come to the village, Sinory organized a prayer, asking God's blessing on their farming.
This year they have decided to grow beans and hope that they will bear much fruit. OM has provided the seeds and helped in other ways.
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The land is owned by a few members of the community and they have agreed that each family who has participated in the labour will get his part when the harvest comes.
Sinory is also in charge of the fellowship of another four surrounding villages where she has been preaching the Gospel and she, with the respective village elders, are planning to have farming for each of these communities for the next season. This has been a great testimony amongst the people who do not yet know God.
This is growing in the communities they are working in but leaders are reluctant to change because of the hold of tradition and what the ancestors would think. It takes years of engagement to see change being led by local leaders. Droughts and crop failure do not help in convincing them to change. But, slowly as relationships are developed, change is happening and mind-sets are able to be addressed.
Ideas for the Future
Plans are developing to run Foundations for Farming in this area for the farmers. Even though it is drought prone, this would improve their produce.
Plans are also developing for the BHW partnership facilitator to visit in October 2018. BHW has not visited South Androy. It is not easy to get there and the last attempt failed as the airlines went on strike.
There are plans in place to empower more women within the community by literacy programs and business skills training with the micro-loans.
They aim to grow the group receiving loans up to 70 people and to introduce community farming into five more communities.
Current Issues and Challenges
The literacy rate is very low and they are working hard to better understand the community economic system to bring transformation from inside.
Local culture and worldview is the main cause of the poverty in this area. Even though people work hard they do not re-invest. They save all their lives for their funeral and this impoverishes them.
Prayer and Praise Points
1) The teams are very thankful to God for the great opportunity to help local people in practical ways. Being able to do this opens up many opportunities.
2) They are thankful to God for lives which have been transformed through the Gospel and the Namana program.
3) Pray for insights to develop the program so that local leaders will be equipped to be able to develop a plan to transform their community through economic empowerment.
4) Pray for the workers to be able to address the poverty mind-sets with Biblical principles. People used to receive handouts from NGOs and the government and have a strong dependency attitude.
Comments from Partnership Facilitator
It is a good move to shift the program to the south of the country. This is where the majority of their focus now lies and where there is great need. The people in that area are very poor, some of the poorest people in Africa. They are trapped in inter-generational poverty.
2017 was the final year of our commitment to this partnership but this will be reassessed once a visit has been completed in 2018.
Last year seven people received loans, two communities were assisted with farming and many were assisted with adult literacy classes. A 6-month adult literacy class for around 20 people costs approx US$U00 to run. Our funding is therefore having considerable impact.