J919N Empower Project Tanzania

Major Objectives

 1.  To Train Village and Church Leaders to be on the forefront of leading economic transformation in their communities.

 2.  To develop a model of assisting agricultural development that is both sustainable and transferable to many other villages.

Key Facts

• 80% of Tanzanians live in rural areas and depend on dry land for their livelihoods, many of these live in extreme poverty.
• They have some of the best soils and yet the worse yields
• Yields are about 10% of their potential 
• Maize is the major crop but the average yield is 3 bags er acre. In the state of Illinois in the US the average yield is 60 bags.

The reasons for the disparity are very simple:

• Over grazing and over ploughing
• soil compaction making it impervious to rain 
• destruction of soil structure
• lack of nutrients and fertiliser/ good seed/weed control / appropriate machinery 
• little knowledge of modern farming techniques 

The major obstacles are about changing the worldview and the character of the individual farmers. The importance of good leadership, management, stewardship cannot be overstated.

 Our aims are to increase the standard and quality of life among smallholder farmers through access to improved farming techniques and business skills.

In the villages we run two-day seminars in which we teach Empowered Worldview in the morning and run practical farmer training in the afternoons.

Our project is now based at Agape College in Tengeru (where we lease land for the workshop and storing and demonstration of the machinery, with training and maintenance). In the classroom, we have integrated Leadership Development and Empowered Worldview training into the curriculum - where farmers and leaders far and wide have enrolled. This helps us achieve training and support efficiently to a much wider network.