By Namonje Namukonda | Operations Manager
Our partnership with GlobalGiving - particularly our individual donors - continues to be an integral partner. Each individual donor has played a critical role in accommodating the needs of impoverished, rural women in Zambia. Since the beginning of the year, there has been regular use of the solar-powered water pump that was installed in late 2021. This allowed the women to start growing vegetables for sale through the farming cooperatives to which they belong. We will commence our formal tomato cultivation project at the end of May.
The farming season in Zambia runs from December to April and it is in these months that the women plant maize (corn) for their sustenance and sell the surplus during the year. We provide robust extension (the agricultural term for training) services during this farming season. From our rigorous field inspections, we have observed vast improvement on crop management with the farmers. We expect higher yields as the rains were adequate and provided favorable conditions for maize cultivation.
Preparation for the pilot tomato growing project is almost complete. Inputs (seed, fertilizer, etc.) will be distributed in mid-May so that we are on schedule to commence by the end of May 2022. With these inputs, each cooperative will cultivate their own plot of tomatoes, which are a high value crop in the region. We will connect the cooperatives with a buyer so that they are able to sell all of their tomatoes.
We are scheduled to have more in-depth training for the women in June. In this training, we want to focus on non-agricultural soft skills, such as entrepreneurship, budgeting, marketing, cost analysis, as well as value addition, which is adding value to their crops by creating new products (for example, converting tomato plants to tomato sauce). Some agricultural skills that we will focus on after June include land preparation, pest scouting, and the management of their fields after harvest. We want to equip them with skills to manage their farms and empower them in other ways so that they can become self-sufficient.
If you read our last report or followed us on social media, you may have heard that we expanded to a new province (Southern Province ). Thus, with your support, we are now operating in two of Zambia’s 10 provinces. This expansion is going well. We hope to have success with the new cooperatives in this province as we have had with the ones in our current province (Lusaka Province).
Thank you for your great generosity! We at The Harvest Fund, greatly appreciate your donations. Your support helps further our mission to help marginalized women achieve their full potential and the eradication of poverty. Your support is invaluable to us.
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