OVERVIEW
Working in three different communities in the capital city Harare and a nearby rural village, our partners will train very poor communities to grow food more effectively and sustainably. In this way each family will have better food security and any surplus crops can be sold to futher help the family. In addition, a well with a pump will be built in the rural village to support the program.
WHAT WE LIKE ABOUT IT
This project doesn’t just provide one-off training and then move on. The families are part of a six-month program where our partner walks them through learning, planting, and harvesting. Each community supplies its own land, labour and some farming equipment. Families will be trained to prepare their land to a high standard. Each village has a farming “champion” which helps ensure buy-in from the local villagers and can be called on to advise and help. Building on a program completed in 2016 villagers can see that working collaboratively and supporting each other brings beneftis to everyone. Demonstration plots planted in 2016 provided visible evidence of the large amounts of food that can be grown.
BUDGET
The budget covers the cost of maize seed, farming equipment, initial training and the well (also the cost of the project administrator and travel between locations).
THE NEED
In recent years, food production in Zimbabwe has been devastated by a number of factors incuding natural disasters and economic and political instability. Recureent droupught, high unemployment and HIV/AIDS (the fifth highest in the world) have contributed to increasing levels of vulnerability and actue food insecurtity. Only 11% of children aged 6-23 months receive a minimum acceptable diet and one third of Zimbabwean children are stunted or short for their age. Life is extremely tough, and insufficient food simply compounds all their other problems.
LIFE CHANGE
