Seeds for Life in Zambia

As the rainy season in Zambia draws to an end rivers and stream are flowing. Though there has been an abundance of rain in some areas, others have had intermittent downpours causing crops to perish due lack of water. The crops that thrive better than maize in these conditions are sorghum and millet, both are less dependent on rain. 

Thanks to a considerable donation 50 schools received a mixture of seeds and fertiliser for their gardens. Now that the rains are over pupils can plant vegetable seeds using water from boreholes donated by The Butterfly Tree. The bigger schools and some community projects have solar-powered water reticulations systems with a water storage tank. This provides easy access to both drinking water and irrigation.

This is also the time to start drilling new boreholes (wells). Drilling companies will not work during the rainy season due to the tracks in the rural areas becoming inaccessible. The first borehole hole to be drilled, earlier this month, was at Ngandu school. The drilling rig was on site at 6am, hour after hour the drilling continued until water was eventually found at 140 metres. The area is rocky therefore metal casing had to be used. The water will be pumped into the storage tank next to the school's kitchen. 660 pupils and teachers now have access to safe drinking water.

Three further boreholes are to be drilled in the next couple of months. The drilling rig is currently at Namukaba school hoping to find water, children currently draw drinking water fro a local stream, which is polluted most especially in the dry season. In the western world we take water for granted and do not realise that there are millions of people that do not have access to safe drinking water.

A new food production warehouse has been developed in Livingstone, which will enable some of our women's project to flourish. The development was initiated for Zambian produce from local growers in order to supply hotels, lodges and shops. Livingstone is the capitol of Zambia tourism and has an abundance of accommodation from backpackers' hostels to five star hotels. No longer will the women need to source markets for their fruit and vegetable enterprises as they can now be sent to the warehouse where they will receive a higher price.

We are so grateful to all our donors and hope that we can raise further funds for more boreholes and water systems.

Links:

• The Butterfly Tree Water Projects