Sustainable Farming to Relieve Hunger in Malawi

As 2020 came to an end, and the rains have come, the trainers in Malawi took a break to let the farmers get their crops planted. 

Since June, when the teams went back out after the initial COVID lockdown, they have trained over 3000 farmers in Malawi (2100) and Kenya (900)

There were 70 training sessions with both men and women who came to learn how to make biochar from field waste, how to make fertilizer with the biochar, and how to improve their animal health by adding biochar to the feed. As subsistence farmers in one of the poorest countries in the world, using biochar will provide long term benefits to the soil.

For now, the farmers are rejuvenating their soils and reaping the benefits of the biochar they make.  

As COVID struck, your support provided sewing machines and an egg incubator for Sister Miriam Paulette in Malawi.  The masks have gone to the community and to the groups doing biochar training, to stay safety compliant.   

The egg incubator has produced over 200 chicks and the nuns are putting biochar in their feed.  They are thriving and Sister has been giving them out to children and their families in need. There is widespread hunger and the chickens provide the families with food or cash for school fees.

Your support of this project has made a huge and lasting impact on those being served. Given the knowledge of how to make and use biochar will continue to improve individual lives, increase crops for better food security, and helps remove smoke from the air, which is a benefit to everyone.

With deep gratitude, 

Dana, Evelind, Michael, and the Malawi Biochar Team

Links:

• Article on Biochar Trench Method and use in Africa

Everyone benefits when biochar is made because it reduces the smoke that fills our air!

But farmers who make biochar are finding it is very beneficial not only in improving their soils by providing better crops but also as a great additive to livestock feed. It helps improve their health!

Our partners in Kenya and Malawi are particularly happy with this benefit. As the word is getting out about the benefits of biochar, and how easy it is to make, people are lining up to learn how to do it. Free training covers building a TLUD and the simplified trench method, as well as how to use the biochar for fertilizer and in animal feed.

Since the beginning of June, more than 1,000 farmers have been trained on how to make their own biochar.

One training in a small village attracted 67 participants, 46 women, and 21 men! Our trainer reported that the group was very happy to receive this training, and she said "they pledged to form farmers clubs in order to have more insights on how they can use the biochar and also how it can be charged [inoculated] for it to be more effective."

Trainer Leyla also takes trainees through the benefits of Biochar to their poultry and livestock by mixing it in their feed or in their pens. The poultry picks up the biochar through pecking when it is scattered on the ground to reduce smells and flies. The water that they drink is also mixed with biochar.  All this boosts their immune system, prevents diseases, and as a result; keeps them healthier and stronger.

The beauty of this program is that it is simple and can be adopted anywhere there is agricultural burning.

Your investment in this program makes the world a better place.  We appreciate your enduring support; this is not an overnight solution but will take time to spread until making biochar instead of open field burning becomes standard practice, around the world. Thank you!

Links:

• Free download of the inspirational story of Sister Miriam