Following the communities’ commitment in February – implementation of income generating projects in communities – we started providing the necessary basic materials to get the projects started.
In February, the communities had all chosen to start with mushroom production as this presented many appreciated advantages: Using waste, a new protein rich food that’s much required in the communities, indoors production which eliminates the concern about soil fertility, quick yield and others.
To avoid delays in securing a piece of land for the project, we invited the mentors and some village leaders to provide space for hosting the project. In Kwekwe, Marange, and Seke, the mentors provided the space and in Odzi the school offered us room in the Agric Unit. We are grateful to them!
Each community has rooms sized at around nine square meters and all are built using the cheapest local materials found in the communities. In these rooms, they have a target to raise $1500 in the period spanning April through July. At the end of July, all mushroom waste will be used to start vegetable gardens and to grow earthworms.
We also adopted a new community in Kuwadzana and we got them started on mushroom production as well. Our Bulawayo team has not started yet; we are still sorting out some issues with the team and will update when all is resolved.
Along with setting up the projects, we also started community classes teaching Basic English to the young girls we work with. Hans Van der Mosen who was volunteering for us facilitated the class along with Chido Govera and Munyaradzi Madhure in Seke. The classes comprised of reading from Gunter’s Fables.
