The community of Makamure and their leaders are so grateful to Bright Hope World for all the support that you are rendering to the community. The community which is in region 5 of Zimbabwe, one of the driest areas of Zimbabwe, is undoubtedly showing signs of getting out of the doldrums of poverty thanks to Bright Hope World. Please find herein below some of the progress taking place in this community so far:
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The people of this community have been very excited by Foundations for Farming such that the trained people have been going out to train others from other villages who were not trained by Fountain of Hope. Towards the end of last year some people from this community, which has 37 villages, went to Harare to be trained to train others to practice farming God’s way in their fields. After the Harare training these enthusiastic trainers came and were given the opportunity to train the community by the chief of the area who believes so much in farming God’s way. Those who were trained were empowered with maize seed each to grow in their fields but unfortunately the rain this season was not very favorable. The community and most parts of Zimbabwe received very little rainfall which was not enough to sustain crops but amazingly those who practiced farming God’s way in this community managed to get something out of their fields. This made people to believe in this way of farming as it produces a good yield even in a bad year or season.
105 of the people who were trained in Foundations for Farming are part of the community garden which was established by Bright Hope World. The garden has a borehole which is powered by a solar pump and which provides water to the people of the community and the garden beneficiaries throughout the whole year. These wonderful farmers took what they were trained in and started to utilize it in their garden and it is our pleasure to report that these farmers have just finished harvesting maize from their garden and are working on planting vegetables. These people were able to sell green mealies from their garden to nearby schools and business centres around the community thereby helping them to have an income.
Thank you so much Bright Hope World that the gift of this garden, Foundations for Farming and the borehole in Makamure is going a long way in improving food security in the community. If it had not been for the problem of climate change this community could be harvesting much in this season.
Challenges
• Rain has been the main challenge as far as Foundations for Farming is concerned
• Another great challenge has been that the entire community has many people and villages and therefore it has been difficult for our team to cover everyone in the community. The whole community has got 37 villages and 19,000 people. It will take a few years to reach out to every person in this community.
Opportunities
• Foundations for Farming is one of the greatest tools that is opening up the eyes of the people and which gives the church the opportunity to let Christ be known
• The establishment of the garden opened an opportunity for the government’s AREX department to get closer to the people
• The gatherings in the garden are working miraculously in opening up opportunities for people to discuss how they can improve the quality of life in their community. People do not come to do farming only but come to talk about how they can build up strong families and therefore Fountain of Hope has taken advantage of these opportunities and has been running workshops on marriage enrichment, entrepreneurship, and child protection (which is going a long way in reducing child marriages in the community).
• People who used not to talk with one another are given the opportunity to work together therefore working on their differences
• Above all the projects have brought the community together such that they are able to tackle problems together.
Children are the future of a community and these have to be cared for, given the guidance they need, provided with the right education, helped to get the documents they need and also be provided with psycho-social support. Madzivire village of Makamure is a remote area which has got schools that are far away from it, there are big rivers around such that during the rainy season children are not able to go to school because it would be difficult to cross such rivers. This is what has caused this community to always be behind because their children are not able to go to school throughout the year.
Makamure is one of the communities in Zimbabwe that was affected badly by HIV/AIDS as well as cholera in 2008 and these epidemics left many children orphans in the community. The socio –economic challenges in the nation also exacerbated the situation as many parents left their homes to look for work on farms in South Africa for better income. These parents are not paid well or are not paid at all and therefore are not able to come back to their children and this has left the community with so many vulnerable children.
It is to this effect that we established the transformation centre to create a better future for children of this community. We are so convinced that education is one of the tools that breaks the yoke of poverty and creates a better future for orphans and vulnerable children. We try to do all that we can to make it possible for children to have a better future through the Transformation Centre. The youth who are part of the Transformation Centre and who are out of school are provided with the opportunity to go through skills training.
We are paying school fees for 37 children as well as help in the running of an infant school in Madzivire village. Apart from that we also run psycho-social support programs for orphans and vulnerable children from this community as a way of helping them to improve resilience in the face of socio-economic challenges that we are going through.
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11 young people (on right) from the community are undergoing agriculture and business training at the moment as a way of empowering them to live independent lives in the community.
Challenges
• The greatest challenge we have in this program is a lack of qualified teachers for the infant school as well as those who would like to help with high school students who did not do well in their exams.
• The other challenge for our team is having all the equipment needed to run psycho-social support programs for orphans and vulnerable children
• Unemployment is very high in Zimbabwe and therefore it is very difficult for those young people who have finished the skills training to find employment
• The economic situation that the nation of Zimbabwe is in is undoubtedly pushing more parents to leave their children to look for better jobs in South Africa and Botswana and some of these find it so difficult to come back home
Opportunities
• The Transformation Centre is one of the tools that God gave us to prepare young people for the future. It provides an opportunity to train, empower, guide, correct, and bring healing to orphans and vulnerable children. It provides also the opportunity to disciple young people to know God and to make Him known.
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The aim of this project is to economically empower vulnerable families in the community of Makamure to own livestock. We empower and train the community to run and manage livestock projects like cattle, goats and chicken farming. Livestock is a form of wealth in communities like Makamure, he who has some livestock is the same as one who has a bank account. Livestock is regarded as an account that is not affected by inflation or by any changes that take place in the market hence we have been encouraging the people of this community to assist one another to own livestock for economic purposes. 20 vulnerable families were empowered to own three goats each and these families have since passed on the goats to the next group of people who would also pass them on and the cascading process go on like that.
Challenges
The greatest challenge with this project is the grazing area for goats in the community. Makamure is a very dry area and it is always difficult to get grass for goats especially during the summer period. Many cattle in this community die during this season because of lack of enough grazing area. We thank God that the community and Fountain of Hope are working together on finding solutions to this problem.
Opportunities
• Goat milk is very rich in proteins, more than cow milk, and therefore it gives a great opportunity for young orphaned children to have better milk
• The project opened a door for the livestock department of the government to come in and give people the advice they need to see this project growing
• Lack of rain has been the biggest problem that this community has been struggling with therefore leaving the community with very little food annually but thank God that the goat project is going a long way in improving food security in the community as people are able to sell their goats in order to buy food for their families.
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This project came as one of the solutions to the growing need for access to healthy food as well as the solution to deforestation. The land in Makamure used to have lots of indigenous fruits in the bush such that people would harvest this and eat throughout the year therefore enabling them not to experience hunger and starvation. Over the years due to growth of the population, all these trees and other indigenous trees were cut down to make space for the growing population. The effect of this has been desertification of the community and also the extinction of fruit trees in the community. It is to this background that the fruit tree project was born to encourage people to grow more trees in their community to fight out two things - desertification and poverty.
The aim of this project is to build a strong community, increase local food security, establish a green canopy in the community and create lasting bonds between people of the community. We educate, assist and inspire the community to grow, steward and utilize perennial food plants.
So far we have trained 100 adults from Makamure community as well as 80 students at Makamure Primary School on how to grow fruit trees in the community. We have also conscientised all the community leaders on the importance of trees to families and the environment.
Challenges
• We do not have a community nursery where people can come and get the fruit trees to grow in the community and at their homes.
• Fruit trees need lots of water in the initial stages and some parts of the community do not have water to irrigate the trees. This therefore makes it difficult for some people in those villages where there is no water to grow trees.
• There is a need for fencing especially when trees are grown at schools
Opportunities
• This project causes the people of the community to learn about their environment, what’s good for them and what’s bad for them.
• Children who are as young as 3 years are being taught how to grow trees and steward trees and therefore the next generation is being empowered to look after trees and the environment
• The project is undoubtedly uniting the entire community.
• The project has the potential to provide a green canopy in the community as well as increasing food security
• The project is going to provide jobs to the young people of the community
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The pass rate at both these schools has been very low although the schools have the biggest number of enrolments in the entire constituency. The reason for the low pass rate at these two schools has been the failure for the schools to get qualified teachers because of the water situation. Teachers would come but would not stay long after realizing that there is no water at the school. It is because of this that the community, with the desire to see an increase in school pass rates, proposed to see a borehole being drilled at the school.
We thank Bright Hope World for making it possible for a solar powered pump to be established at these two schools at the beginning of this year. The borehole is not only going to provide water to the two schools but also a clinic that is under construction. One borehole is bringing complete life to the whole community, 1500 students and 30 teachers are already benefitting from this project. As well the whole community of Makamure is going to benefit once the clinic is finished.
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Thank you again Bright Hope World for your love and care for the people of this community. The people of the community amazingly worked hard with our staff members digging trenches to ensure that water reaches the schools and the clinic. Pipes were taken to a tank up the mountain since both schools are built at the foot of the mountain, all is working perfectly well and the commissioning of this borehole is going to be done soon.
Challenges
• The economic challenges that Zimbabwe is going through have caused us to go outside the country to buy the equipment needed for this project.
• These people had never had running water before so some of them would hoard the water anticipating the borehole to go dry during the first weeks of providing them with water. Actually some of them are still hoarding water.
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• This project is expected to increase the school pass rate at the two schools, both primary and secondary, as qualified teachers will now be flocking to the schools
• The borehole at these schools has unlocked the key for students from these schools to be able to participate in various sporting disciplines since they now have water
• The students are going to learn agriculture which is the backbone of Zimbabwean economy and some of them would be expected to practice this at their homes
• The borehole is also going to increase the health status of the community as a clinic is going to be established soon, qualified nurses and doctors will be coming to this clinic
• The school is going to establish an orchard as well as a school garden so that the students will be able to sell the produce to raise funds for the school