Highlands Trip Continued…the business team

Highlands team of 16 people was divided into two different groups while in the east. One team was focused on the business projects, the other, embracing and supporting the community through initiatives relating to Health, Church and Education. My next post will talk more about the latter, but here I will tell you more about the team that focused on creating opportunities for development within the culture through business projects.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I had narrowed the focus of business opportunities down to three areas prior to the teams arrival.
1. Dairy
2. Cattle Slaughterhouse (meat & hides)
3. Tourism

The team met with various people from the mayor of the district, to the individual farmers. Read on below to learn more about the area and what the team did.

From left to right: Tyler (missions pastor at Highlands), Dave, Jim, Dwight (country director of Rwanda), Mugabo Wilson (Head of Rwimiyaga Sector).

The team discusses possible ways to increase tourism in the area. Their are a variety of ways that this could be done and multiple project possibilities were discussed. Mugabo is eager to work with the team in his sector. He is truly one of the men you can quickly identify as a pillar within his community. He was very gracious to the team and incredibly helpful in shaping a better understanding of the community.

Cows like the one pictured above, a African long-horn variety, are found all over the east. But in recent years the government has pushed for a more productive type of cow, a frisian cow. The frisian breed is similar to what we have in the states and in Europe. It produces a much higher volume of milk. Farmers have been selling off their local cows in order to purchase the new and highly acclaimed frisians, but this hasn’t happened without challenges. The frisian cow needs a different type of feed than the traditional cows. Left to graze in the area the cow usually doesn’t receive enough water to digest the grass, this can lead to low production, or worse health issues in the animal (some which lead to death). The remedy would be feeding the cows bailed, dried out grass; this too has issues since the milling industry here lacks enough raw product to run at capacity, and thus, there isn’t enough supply to create feed for the cattle.

Another issue with bringing in the new cows is rooted in the mentality of the farmers. In the past wealth was shown in the amount of head one has in his heard. The government is asking farmers to have, for example,  maybe 5 frisian or hybrid cows instead of 25 head of traditional cattle. Though the frisian and hybrids produce more milk, this has met resistance because of the mindset ingrained in farmers throughout history. A huge challenge here is moving focus away from quantity and onto quality.

While we weren’t focused immediately on initiatives that were directly related to agriculture, the industry makes up 30% of peoples income in the East. Thus many of our conversations brought us back to a point of understanding how people farm, what opportunities have not been exploited, and how we can assist in that development. One of the team members, Rob, has a strong background in farming and proved to be invaluable to this process.

A large portion of the teams time was spent better understanding the dairy market, and looking at the potential of a newly assembled dairy plant. The plant (shown above) is the only one in the east, an area that produces the majority of Rwandas milk. In fact, dairy accounts for 40% of households incomes in the Eastern province. This plant wasn’t without issues, and dairy as an industry faces a very unsure future. But the team left with a great deal of information and several relationships that will allow for further investigation into ways the team may integrate out vision with this industry.

Pictured above: Dr. Jackson and Rob investigate the packaging machinery at the dairy plant and consider cost effective improvements.

One of the organizations that we spend time with was EADD (East African Dairy Development), a project funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This team of qualified staff from all over Eastern Africa provided us with great insight into the dairy and farming industries. One of the initiatives of this organization is to educated and empower local co-operatives like the one above.

This tractor was purchased by a farming cooperative in Gacundezi. The farmers each pay a portion of the tractor and then it is used to rotate through and plow the crops of all the farmers. Currently this one tractor is not enough for the cooperative, but the fact that they made the purchase and are organized in using it shows their willingness to develop and improve their crops. It looks as though there is already an opportunity for the highlands group to assist in this process by further educating the farmers on the cost/benefit to various types of farming equipment; something we plan to do in conjunction with what the EADD is already doing in the area.

Pictured above: Rob discusses various farming topics while Phil and Nathan attentively listen on.

Pictured above: The team eating at a restaurant I frequented in Nygatare.

Pictured above: Phil, a valuable member of the business team and pastor at Highlands Church,  contemplating the depth of a conversation that had ended moments before, revealing an inside perspective on the genocide.

The Next Step

The team left with a great deal of information, a better understanding of the current situation, and a wide array of connections that they hope to develop into long term relationships. Over the next weeks, months and even years we hope that this time will have proven to be one in which seeds were planted. With time we will see if and how they grow.

“Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease.” -Jeremiah 29:5-7

Time to catch up…

It has been over a week since I have had an opportunity to update my blog. As you can imagine, a lot has happened during that time. So, I will be doing my best this week to update you on everything and share some of my photos as I do. This is Part I with additional posts soon to follow!

Highlands Team

The Highlands team has come and gone. The week was, in my opinion, successful in that it provided a more tangible direction for the development of the next steps and phases of the partnership. I’ll try to update you more on what this will mean, but for now I’ll just tell you about the teams first couple days that were spent here in Kigali.

After everyone arrived on Saturday, having only lost one bag (which was quite quickly recovered), we took the team out to dinner at the “New Cactus.” A great little restaurant with a nice variety. One thing I appreciated about this team was how seamless the team seemed to integrate. People were quickly sharing their stories and identifying common bonds. Much of dinner was conversation which did just that.

18 people crammed in to the van. Highlands team…welcome to Rwanda.

On Sunday the team all went to a local church service here in Kigali. It was a beautiful service, taking a deeper look at the Holy Spirit and how we as Christians allow ourselves to be impacted by the Spirit. It was an appropriate reminder for the team prior to our heading east. Following the service we went to the genocide memorial in Kigali. It was my first time to the memorial, an experience that is both enlightening and crushing. The memorial is made up of various displays composed inside a museum of sorts, all which educate people on the different contributing factors, outcomes, and consequences of the genocide. Surrounding these buildings are various gardens and burial grounds for memorial victims, one which holds the remains of over 200,000 genocide victims. I can’t speak for the team as a whole, but for me, it was a dark reminder of the capacity within humans to engage in evil, which unchecked, can breed into death on all levels…utter catastrophe. I spent a fair amount of time contemplating the ramifications to this and the implications for how we can learn from the genocide. Further, what does it mean to experience (from a distance) such darkness as a Christian, how should we respond? What is our place? I think most of the group left asking similar questions. Sunday evening we went through a briefing of how our week would be spent, followed by a fantastic dinner hosted by a couple here in Rwanda that has ties to Highlands.

Monday morning the majority of the group visited the FH office while a few went to the nearby IJM (International Justice Mission) office to learn more about their ministry in the area. IJM is working diligently to bring justice through the legal system to the people of Rwanda. While much of this used to be related to the genocide, now, the majority of the issues are related to land ownership and the education of local leaders specifically related to the law. After that the team enjoyed lunch at the Jackson’s, graciously hosted by Dwight and Brenda (Brenda is an amazing host and fantastic cook).

Rwandan Proverb.

By about one in the afternoon we loaded up and headed east to the Nygatare district. On the way we stopped at a small restaurant on  Muhazi lake to grab drinks and use the restroom. It was there that I saw the bird below, a great crested crane, the national bird of Rwanda. We enjoyed the break, and several people also enjoying the opportunity to get some great photos. We then loaded into the vehicles to finish the final leg of the trip.

We arrived in the Rwimiyaga sector and after being welcomed to the area by the head of the sector we proceeded to the primary school where team members were able to meet their sponsored children. It was a bitter sweet time for most of the team. Though  a lot of joy came with the time they spent with their sponsored children, there were questions raised about the other 1200 + kids at the school and 250+ children registered in the CDP (Child Development Program) but not yet sponsored. All and all it was a good experience for the team. Following that we went to the Blue Sky Hotel in Nygatare and got all checked in. The first 48 hours had been good, more was soon to come.