February Update
Voices of Africa has been very busy this February! We were able to get the one acre farm plot as we had hoped and have been busy learning about and tending to the ducks, fish, tomatoes, and other crops. The two natural springs honestly just spring out of the Earth and provide water through the entire farm. We have 4 boys who have joined us in our work and they have been occupied digging the drainage canals and getting the beds ready to be planted.
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Right now the hardest task is the infrastructure development. The pond and the ecosystem are already mature. The previous farmer was not concerned with the “how-tos” of planting and somehow seeds were sown as if by the wind. The soil when turned is a deep black. They call it black cotton soil and it is amazing at holding moisture. If we plan it properly with irrigation trenches we should be able to get three harvests year. That is a whole lot of food to provide nutrition to these children and many more.
Our RocketHub campaign generated $700. We used the funds to buy farming tools for the boys, textbooks, fare for Jumaa to come to visit from Mombasa to bring two laptops. One laptop was for Forever Angels, the orphanage next door, and another was for the boys. We want to thank Sima Marine for their kind donation and hope they will be pleased with the difference their contribution has made. The boys are now learning to do online research about agriculture in Kiswahili. These funds also bought food and paid our local staff for a month.
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We are now getting to the learning application phase. A compost pile is going and we are hoping to build a vermaculture project in the near future. We are looking for volunteers with hands-on permaculture experience to join us for a little while and help us to set up the proper systems and to teach these kids permaculture principles. If anyone is interested please contact us at innovation@voicesofafrica.org.
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For our educational programs, March 3rd we launched an IndieGogo campaign to enable us to create TabLabs in local Mwanza schools. We are asking for your support to bring tablet devices powered on solar to classrooms without basic educational materials as an interactive learning tool and textbook substitute. Every child should have the opportunity to learn the basic information required for functioning in society. Computer programming is its own language and can be taught with no words in almost any tongue. Other Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics apps are freely available and we believe will post the actual achievement of the individual students who use the software.
Our healthcare project with African Woman Alliance is going well as we finalize the Facility Audit application and are beta testing it in facilities. We will have some interesting facts to share later in March about how maternal health projects we are supporting Lake Zone communities are progressing.
March is shaping up to be another great month thus far but we would have to spill the beans all at once. Watch for the next update the first week of April.
Thank you as always for your support.
Voices of Africa