There’s a new kind of litter patrol in Ofesi, Malawi. Residents in the community of Ofesi worked together to identify insufficient sources of income as a community issue. Ofesi’s solution? Goats. Easy to care for, with lots of benefits for their owners, goats are the easy choice. Finding food nearly anywhere, goats are extremely resilient and do not have special dietary needs. Therefore, this makes it very cost effective for group members caring for them. Goats provide a wide variety of benefits including milk, organic fertilizer, kids (the baby goat variety), meat, and leather. Also, to maximize the benefits, the group in Ofesi is purchasing 18 of them (16 females and 2 males).
GOATS ARE A Group Effort
Firstly, all group members will contribute to their well-being. secondly, members will get their own goats as they produce offspring. Meanwhile, the group is participating in a training led by a local government agriculture worker to learn the proper and effective goat care. During these training sessions, members are learning about proper feeding, vaccinations, grazing techniques, and other general care information. And, they’ve even already learned how to build a proper goat house! After training on goat house construction, members went to work purchasing materials and assembling the structure.
GOAT HOUSE Construction Complete
With their goat house completed, the group is ready to find their new, furry friends!
And so, with the project fully underway, members are looking forward to higher crop yield with manure fertilizer. This will increase income from selling crops at market. And, it will also decrease malnutrition among children and elderly community members because of the greater availability of food. Now, we know what you’re thinking, “You’ve goat to be kidding me with all these benefits!?” But we can assure you that this project might just be one of the greatest of all time. And the list goes on! The members will be able to use their increased income to pay school fees for their children’s education, reducing illiteracy rates. Not only that, they’ll also be able to use their income to pay for other basic needs, housing improvements, etc.
The implementation of this project will allow the community members to gain skills and knowledge in project and financial management. And their work as a group will continue to become even more sustainable! First item on the agenda: Chew grass!
How to Help
Donate today to strengthen empower communities to find solutions to issues of poverty! See how other issues are being addressed through Outreach’s process of community-led development.
