And More Good Sh*t...

In old days manure from various animals, once dried, was used as medicine!
It was rubbed on the body, mixed into food, or made into a tea!
Did you know that dried manure can be burned to keep houses warm or for cooking fuel?
No shit!

Greetings from what is now, here anyway, The  Nkunda U Rwanda Project -a kinder, gentler name we've adopted locally that means "The I Love Rwanda Project".
It seems "The Shit Starts Here" just doesn"t translate.

Our meeting today was with the Executive, yes Executive, of a cooperative of ex-poachers who refer to themselves as 'The Hope Group'.
There are 567 members, divided into 16 groups, spanning a distance of 60km.

We were positively blown away!
From the president to the accountant, this Executive was organized and cohesive, proving that a lack of resources doesn't equal a lack of intelligence!

A small group of hunters had voluntarily stopped poaching in 2000.
In 2007 The National Park started paying a small allowance to the first ex-poachers to encourage others to join them.
Their numbers have grown steadily since then, recognizing that it was better for them, their community and the future of their children to protect the animals and their environment.
Today, having given up illegal hunting, those that do not have land to farm are limited to making potato seeds to sell at market and carving wooden gorillas and walking sticks for sale to tourists for income.
While every family has a small house, for those who do not have land, farmland is shared, kibbutz style.

We were originally only meeting with these representatives to determine if and when we might begin working with a new cooperative.
Thinking that we wanted to see our first cooperative of porter/farmers firmly established, and knowing that set-backs are still likely to occur, we were thinking that maybe in another year or so we'd be ready to expand.

Well, we were so impressed with The Hope Group that we decided to excellerate our timetable and begin immediately.
In fact, an initial proposal for a contract will be drafted before we leave Musanze.

Now, sourcing 567 sheep for purchase is a daunting and expensive task, so we agreed to start with roughly half the cooperative, knowing the rest would have to wait a year or more, after the start date more than 3 months away.
How to decide who the recipients would be?

We were once again blown away when the Executive of The Hope Group immediately suggested that we focus our efforts on those most in need.

Wonderfully not the expected "what about me" thinking

They brought to our attention an area they call The Critical Zone.
The soil is especially poor and it is located near the animals in the National Park, thus being a constant temptation to revert to illegal hunting.
6 of the 16 groups live in this area, roughly 220 families.
So we will be purchasing 220 females and 44 males.

We're stoked!

And the shit continues...

The next few days  will be a whirlwind of various farm visits, meetings with local government officials, banks, and even the Park Warden, and last but not least, one of the neediest of the local schools.

A special thank you goes out to the kids at Perth Elementary School who raised $100 one dollar at a time, selling bracelets, to help buy 2 sheep.
The beautiful story book they made has pleased and amazed both young and old alike.
And to Trish, the very special  teacher/librarian that inspired them, our thanks for passing on "The Truth About Poop", a charming and insightful book for kids of all ages that has inspired the "what next?" part of our collective efforts here.

Stay tuned for more shit...

Good Sh*t...

 

4 flights and 31 hours later we arrived in Kigali.
What an amazing and remarkable 2 days we've had!
We are back in Ruhegeri, now  called Musanze.
Our meeting today with the various leaders of the porter/farmers cooperative was so reassuring.
Any doubts we had about the success of the project and the motivation of the cooperative dissipated as we listened to their stories, frustrations, successes and their hopes for the future.

This past year has been a growing curve for all of us and while mistakes were made, we are all happy to report that more than 170 sheep have been born since September (plus the 220 we gave them!)
Some ewes have already had as many as 3 babies, which is a wonderful surprise as we were hoping, at best, for 2.
And already we are hearing about the positive results of sheep manure in the soil.
One farmer told us that last year his potato crop yielded roughly 300lbs whereas this year, using the sheep manure, his yield was over 1000lbs. That's half a ton of potatoes! And a 300% increase in just one year.
Some of the porters expressed pride in being able to offer excess manure to their neighbours.
They also pointed out that finally understanding the numerous long-term values of raising sheep elevates their pride in sheep ownership to that of owning a cow, traditionally considered culturally superior.

Our numbers could have been even higher but sadly, there were a few still births, and some died, along with the mothers, of complications during the birthing.
Some of the sheep also turned out to be sterile.
Illnesses among the sheep, including foot rot and worms, were dealt with using antibiotics. 
A significant number of newborns also died because of exposure to the cold climate of winter.
Just for the record, cold winters here mean temperatures of 9 degrees celcius. Ha!
And yes, a few sheep died or were mysteriously stolen (impossible as they were tagged and therefore recognizable) just in time for Christmas dinner!
It was decided by the cooperative that these sheep would be replaced by the owners or they would have to leave the cooperative.
No sheep have disappeared since.
A great sign that the cooperative is finally working together with eyes on the future, a huge step forward!

So what's next?

To avoid a repeat of deaths due to cold weather, and to prevent having to keep the sheep in the already crowded little houses the families live, we are working with a Rwandan bank to help provide sheep pens to all the porter/farmers, using sheep as collateral. 
Fabulous!
The cooperative has determined that the ideal number of sheep per family is 4, specifically  3 females and 1 male. 
That provides the farm with the necessary fertilizer. 
Any more than that becomes income for them when the excess sheep are sold. 
Add to this the additional income generated by increased crop yield!
That income buys a better diet, improves health care and guarantees education for the children. And it's on-going and self-sustaining as the sheep continue to reproduce.
Amazingly, in just a little over one year, these subsistence farmers are elevating themselves to being professional farmers.

And we've all learned the number of sheep born last year could have been higher if we had had more rams (males), so 27 additional males will be sourced from those born in the last year, in exchange for new females. 
Our reproduction ratio will now be 1 male to every 5 females. 
Party on boys!

Getting Their Sh*t Together...

According to a report from Paul, the collective seems to be grasping the bigger picture and rallying.
We are booked to return to Rwanda on October 10th, to see and hear for ourselves how things are going and where we go from here.
We will be in the town of Musanze (formerly Ruhengeri) from October 12th to October 18th.

In those 6 days we will meet with the leaders of the porters' collective and make visits to a few farms to see...
1)how the farmers collect the ifumbire (manure)?
2)where the farmers keep the ifumbire?
3)how the farmers use the ifumbire?
4)if the soil is improving.
5)how we can test the soil to see what it was like before and after they use the ifumbire?
6)where the farmers keep their sheep and how they look after them
7)a baby sheep being born, if possible.

We want to meet with the most important leaders of the ex-poachers collective.
We want to talk with them to make sure that they recognize our commitment and understand what will be involved in joining our project so that previous communication breakdowns are not repeated.

Amahoro!

Getting Our Sh*t Together...

As if the joyous births of two grandsons in April and May weren't enough to postpone our plans to return to Rwanda in late June, a tornado hitting our property on Stoney Lake early in June, knocking over more than 50 trees, meant that we weren't going in July or August either!
Further, a visit to the porters' collective by our Rwandan co-founder Paul revealed that the porters had not exactly held up their end of the contract. They were grateful for the sheep but decided that we would not be returning as both the distance from their home to ours and the cost of travel was unfathomable. As a result, no meetings were held by the collective and no updates regarding farmlife, use of the manure or crop yield were gathered.
We were so disappointed. Disillusioned. Deflated.
Do we give up? Walk away?
During the past 2 months, Paul personally visited almost every porter to explain, once again, the bigger picture of this endeavour.
In all fairness to the porters, it is hard for us, coming from a culture used to planning for tomorrow and for many years down the road,  to understand the mindset of a people who live from day to day.  
More than 120 lambs have been born since last September. Many of them will be pregnant in the coming months, as will the original ewes. More sheep means more shit. That part of the project is definitely a success.
We aren't giving up. We're regrouping!

The Shit continues-our next initiative

We're heading back to Ruhengeri in June, excited to meet with the porters again and see hopefuly 100+ new lambs, and to begin another sheep initiative. This time we'll be providing sheep to a large collective of 450 ex-poachers who are now working with Park rangers and wardens, teaching them what kind of traps to look for and where to find them, where to find poacher's hideouts and re-educating poachers toward conservation as a means of income security.
Here are some photos of an ex-poacher showing a Park ranger what a trap might look like and how it works.

We are encouraged by communication from local administration and international veterinarians working with the gorillas and other wildlife inside the park, that anything done to improve the circumstances of the local communities ensures wildlife protection. We'll be reviewing the success of the tagging/contract model to verify sheep provided last year are thriving, and will apply the same model to this next, larger initiative.
Here are some of our recent newborns...

The Sh*t Starts Here- A Guardian Project Initiative

ifumbire (ee-foom-be-ray)