Support Quality Schooling of 250 Kids in Nguluni

Thank you dear partners for your continued support to helping keep over 150 children in school.

 In our effort to this we have succeeded in starting the project , but in every success we face challenges.

Challenges

The project faced a major challenge with water.

The reason being the project start date delayed .

 The rainy season also came late and this meant investing in fetching water. With little resources this has struggled and forced the greenhouse manager to use untested water which introduced bacterial wilt into the greenhouse.

The drip system  was not in use due to unavailability of enough water. This forced the use of  knapsack sprayer which broke down due to heavy use which is yet to be replaced.

The lack of water affected the quality of fruiting.

Bacterial wilt affected the quality of fruits as well as subsequent harvests due to 150 plants being affected.  These had to be uprooted to stem the spread of the bacterial wilt inside the greenhouse.

The returns lost from the above would total about 200,000 in sales.

These will however be countered by the tomatoes that were planted out side the green house (50 plants)

With proper rains coming in the end of October, we managed to plant water melon that are now being weeded.

Earlier on we tried covering for the damage by planting capsicum which did not take off.

We later succeeded in planting more tomatoes in the nursery and these will be ready for replanting in about seven to fourteen days.

 Labour

The greenhouse employed 1 casual worker being paid 3,500 per month (36$).

Parents were also involved in fetching water for the plants. This contributed towards their children's fee payments. This has helped 5 parents pay for their children's fees, a total of about 15 children.

 Sales 

The greenhouse has been able to sell 2,000/= for the last two weeks since full harvesting started.

Plans are to be able to sell maximum produce from the greenhouse to be able to purchase a Refill kit that costs about Ksh 30,000 ($316) and fumigation of Ksh 20,000 ($211)

Other plans include working to build The Community Poultry Project which involves 8 of our school children . This will contribute towards our Kids Entrepreneurship Program with a focus towards Agri-Business Sector.

To be able to do this great work, Acres of Mercy will need partners continued support. We thank you all in advance for the continued support .