After leaving Kacungwa, our team was privileged to visit Africa Renewal University and Bethany Village where we saw some very innovative ideas being born. It is in these locations that creativity is encouraged and future leaders being enabled to change Uganda.
I had visited Africa Renewal University 2 years ago (Life in the Dormitory) and was impressed by the young people attending university. Jeff Atherstone, president of the university, has created an environment where people are encouraged to be innovative and think in new ways. As a result, in areas ranging from technology to agriculture, new ideas are being developed.
Since 2013, ARU has taken the rabbit farm and not only continues to raise rabbits, but teaches people throughout the country now to raise them. Thorough training classes and selling rabbits now enables people to safely raise enough rabbits on an on-going basis to continue to provide ample meat to eat. Pastor Sylver was very interested in this and will pursue this as an opportunity for the people of Kacungwa.
In addition to the rabbits, improved farming methods allow farmers to manage more land with less labor. One simple method is related to growing bananas and plantains. By using the discarded leaves/limbs from the trees to cover and compost the ground, the soil will retain moisture, compost to provide nutrients to the soil and reduce/eliminate the weeds that are so time consuming to manage. Jeff says that by doing this one thing, a single person can increase the amount of the ground managed from 1.5 acres to nearly 5 acres.
ARU technology staff have also recently completed a new 30-station computer lab. They are utilizing “thin client” workstations to reduce power consumption, cost and extended life-cycle of the equipment because it performs better in the harsh conditions. Having seen computer labs at Makerere Univeristy (the largest university in Uganda), this lab rivals anything there!
The young people studying at Africa Renewal University are the ones who will soon be be the ones returning to their villages and leading them into the future. It is encouraging to see this aspect of the Africa Renewal Ministries’ work in developing leaders. While we were there, we met Betsy, who we were blessed to work with in Kacungwa last time we were there in 2012. Betsy is in the picture below between Renee and Pastor Sylver’s wife Allen on the ARU campus.
Another visit we had was a day at Bethany Village. Bethany Village is ARM’s model village that includes orphan homes where 10 children live with a house mother, a medical clinic, school, camp and large farm. In the past few years, many advancements have been made at Bethany Village that are noteworthy.
When we first stepped off the boat at the dock, we were immediately struck by the beautiful paint on the buildings and the new brick-lined walkways. The appearance in just so inviting that you smile just to see such a beautiful setting.
After touring the village and visiting some of the children’s homes, we went on a tour of the farm. There were a few things we saw there that we were really impressed by. First was the piggery. When we were there in 2012, they had a piggery that was pretty traditional and smelled that way. Over the past few years, they have created new pig stalls that have been dug down, filled with corn stalks & husks, saw dust and then use composting to eliminate waste and almost eliminate the smells. I thinks the pigs looked very happy to be there!
Henry, the farm manager, then lead us on a tour of the rest of the farm and showed us that each of the children’s homes have their own plot of land where they grow their own food and common grounds where they can grow extra food to sell and raise money for Bethany Village. There are greenhouses used to grow some crops less tolerant to the outside conditions – though none of us wanted to go into them because of the HUGE spiders.
We were then lead to the newest project on the farm – raising talapia. Talapia is one of the most popular food fish in Uganda and is able to be raised in fairly small space. Bethany farm has set up a Talapia farm with (4) 800 gallon tanks. Each tank contains between 600 & 800 fish. Water from Lake Victoria is pumped into the tanks and then cycled through an adjacent trough where they are doing some hydroponic farming. Styrofoam platforms have holes in them holding plants ranging from tomatoes to okra. They are experimenting with new vegetables constantly.
The water is cleaned by the plants and cycled back into the fish tanks using solar-powered pumps. After a period of time, the water is flushed out of the system and used to water an adjacent garden with the water replaced by fresh water from the lake. The fish are only raised to a certain size because the people buying them can often only a certain sized fish. This can be a model for future Talapia farms throughout Uganda. The cost is about $15,000 for the entire setup.
Besides the obvious innovative ideas being developed and becoming a reality that will affect the lives of Ugandans, what we met just some of brilliant people in Uganda being enabled by the various programs of Africa Renewal Ministries to become the future leaders of Uganda and the world.
Great post Dave. Much progress since our last visit. Thanks for sharing these pictures - the computer lab looks great. But no boda-boda ride?
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