Malawi Report for 2014 by Dave Toms

HILLTOP FARM :

This year has been a year to remember, with progress on all fronts.  The main day to day focus is on food production as we have over 50 hectares of land.  This year our 50-60 partners on the farm had good harvests, for which we thank God.  Our de-cobber at the milling shed did a great job helping all our partners remove the pips from the corn (maize) cobs and then bag it.(for a small fee paid in maize).  This de-cobbing used to be done by hand and took months of evenings rubbing fingers raw.  The PDFA land (about 5 hectares of the total) also produced well and so we are in a good position at Hilltop with stores well stocked with maize, beans and Soya.  Most of our partners returned again in September to prepare the land once again for the 2015 season - I am glad to report that the rains have started well this December 2014 (although a little late) and germination has gone well throughout the farm - so expectations are high for 2015 :)  The compost manure project was also successful this year with mountains of waste organic material being turned into high quality compost manure, which has been placed into our planting stations to improve the soils and boost the growth of our crops in 2015.

It has been wonderful to see our partners lifting themselves out of poverty gradually and with much effort on their behalf !  God has given them an opportunity and they are embracing this journey out of poverty with both hands.  It is also good to see their faith in Jesus grow as they see the fruit of their trust in Him, both in growing resources and in the peace and harmony they are experiencing in their lives.

This year end PDFA has not cultivated any land at all (for 2015 harvest) and we have thus increased the land available to our partners.  Our plan is to use the maize stored and the piggery to fund our running costs at Hilltop in 2015.  We are very excited about this step and would like Hilltop to be fully sustainable in 2015 and hopefully forever going forward.  We are trusting God that we will be successful with this new phase and only time will tell.  Pray for us please.  We wish to model what we are teaching our people, which is to trust God, be sustainable and to put away the beggar bowl.  May God give us success !!

The piggery project is going well and we are hoping that 2015 will be a good year.  As long as disease does not affect us we should be fine.  We have about 25 porkers (40-60kg) to sell and this will give us income to pay wages and make some extensions.  We will add some new pig stalls in the 2nd shed in 2015 to give sufficient space for all our females to have their piglets safely and with sufficient space.  Our new boar (new bloodline) is growing nicely and we hope that he will do a good job for us in 2015.  We have much hope resting on the piggery and so would value your prayers in this area too, that God would protect us from disease or other calamities.

We have made good improvements on the farm too.  The 2nd shed got a decent floor this year and at the house we added new gutters around the whole house with downpipes and we also bought a double bed, 2 cupboards and 2 suitcase stands to make for more comfortable visits by our guests.  So, things are looking much nicer and are more comfortable too.

We continued with our simple churches around the farm and in the surrounding villages and it was good to visit many of them in 2014.  The times spent in these small groups is always special to me and to see the joy of the folks as the "lights come on" is always special to me.  The interaction during the simple church meetings is also excellent and very edifying for all involved.  I love these forms of meetings - they are my favourite !!

We continued to train in farming, savings clubs and micro business at the farm and in the surrounding villages.  We have 2 formal groups with over 20 folk that meet weekly plus other day to day less formal mobilising and training.  We encourage our leaders to disciple and shape people's lives every day and in every way, not just during training sessions.  

We limited our micro loans in 2014 to our leaders and staff around Hilltop farm and Blantyre city.  No loans were made in the valley during 2014.  Sadly, one of our loans to John Gulumasa to start a local bakery (made end of 2013) has gone unpaid - John passed away unexpectedly during 2014.  Adding to the grief was the fact that his wife had just had twins a month earlier - their first children.  Shame, this has been a disaster to their family and we are not pursuing the debt with the family - we have cancelled it.  

VALLEY PROGRESS :

2014 was also an exciting year down in the Shire valley.  It is one of the hottest places I go to so I do find travelling there rather challenging :)  Nevertheless it has been a rewarding year to be involved in the valley.  On the church front the request by some valley churches to link with the Mozambique leadership has been a positive step.  This has led to several visits by the Moz leaders plus additional trips from myself and our Malawi team to encourage and unify the individual churches and small groups of churches.  There is currently great enthusiasm amongst these churches and everyone is looking forward to 2015 and the additional visits, teachings and conferences that will occur to encourage the churches, develop the leaders and mobilise the people for God.  The valley conference in 2014 went well with Pastor Noel and proved to be a catalyst for the positive improvements.  We are now looking at about 25 churches working well together with much promise for 2015.  It is my prayer and hope that more churches will join the group in 2015 (some new ones and others that had got disillusioned and had left due to leadership issues).

Unfortunately Valley Frank, the leader of one group of churches, is still not well.  This despite our best efforts to get him better medical treatment.  Effectively he stopped leading his churches some time back and this lead to the disintegration and loss of many churches within his group.  Recent steps have turned things for the better, I believe :)  Sadly, I expect Frank to pass away in 2015.  I hope I am wrong and that God restores his health but so far things are not promising.  Please pray for Frank.

2014 has been a stellar year for the adult literacy schools !  Support for the schools has been excellent and we continually get requests to start more classes in new areas.  Virtually each new church that joins us has requested adult literacy classes for their members and for their community too.  We have about 10 areas now that have schools and we will add to that in 2015.  Feedback from the schools has been excellent and positive and it is a delight to me to encounter ladies in meetings who have Bibles and can read thanks to this wonderful project.

Our orphan care involvements have grown too in 2014.  I have been greatly encouraged by the efforts of very poor people to make the most of what they have and to give everything they have to care for the orphans in their communities.  I know from the Bible that this makes God very happy.  What has encouraged me most has been the fact that they have initiated these projects themselves without depending on us.  They have made these good initiatives for the right reasons and at great personal sacrifice.  I have been happy to see the 42+ orphans at valley Franks area (Rivunzu) still getting care despite Frank's illness - the committee has risen to the occasion well and has done a good job feeding and educating the little ones.  in addition to this I have visited another care centre at Nkhate (about 65 kids) and am aware of another orphan care project that my Hilltop manager has visited to confirm.  So, wonderful work is being done by these folk !  God has moved their hearts and they have responded with compassion and mercy, despite having very little to offer.  I like the way these projects operate.  No orphan centres are being built.  Rather, these children are being placed / kept within extended families and church families.  They are living in normalised family situations and the church buildings are used to provide day care, extra care, basic pre - school education and extra meals.  Our role has been in helping with additional education materials and toys, buckets and drums for water etc.  We also provided 80 bags of maize to the care centres at Rivunzu and Nkhate during 2014.  The 50 bags at Rivunzu were used to provide meals at the church day care centre whilst at Nkhate the 30 bags was divided and food was sent to the families who are feeding the orphans at night in their homes.  We will continue to help these centres and more during 2015 without creating dependency, resources permitting.

CONCLUSION :

There has been a lot of hard work put in at Hilltop and in the valley during 2014.  Results have been excellent and I am greatly encouraged by progress at the farm and in the valley.  I am very proud of our Malawi Team :)  2015 promises to be a year of greater maturity and significant development.  We look forward to what 2015 will bring.  THANK YOU for being partners with us in all that we do.  So many lives have been impacted positively through your sacrifices !  What you have done and your open hearts and generous spirits have inspired much.  You are greatly appreciated !!!

Ongoing Success at Hill Top Farm

In it's fourth year, Hill Top Farm continues to succeed in it's goal of sustainable development.

PDFA has partnered with about 50 families to farm this land. Currently, maize, beans, soya, chic peas, vegetables and pigs are being farmed. There are also 20 bee hives. The farm produces it's own compost.

Here are a few of the latest pictures (from the top: the Farm management team, the maize storage, the new piglets and a view of the farm from the main house):

Dave's update on Hill Top Farm and the Valley

Dave's update:

"I returned Saturday evening from 2.5 weeks in Malawi and what a good trip it was :)


We are busy resolving the orphans impending food crisis (Dec-Feb) with a gift received.  The kids will be ok with the rice harvested now until year end.
 
The adult literacy classes (mini schools) are flourishing with 8 on the go now in different areas !  It’s gone crazy and it was so satisfying to see women (and a few men too) reading aloud at meetings and even at the conference. 

Up in Blantyre we had some amazing children and youth times !  The visiting youth I had from the USA were brilliant.  The highlight for me was a Friday / Saturday youth event we hosted at the farm with about 60 youth. Made a HUGE fire in the ball room Friday night :)

The farm is going well.  Maize harvest is finally in, treated and counted.  We have a very good 269 bags in stores, which will help us greatly to achieving sustainability.  Beans and Soya currently being cleaned, treated and bagged.  Peas just harvested.  Sunflower still in the field.  First honey harvest in a while is being processed now – hopefully we will get about 30kg.  Organic compost project is flying along nicely.  Piglets x9 are growing nicely and their bigger cousins are mostly pregnant so many more piglets should be around soon."

A few pictures (from the top: the crops on the farm; Foster and his team; and the pigs)

Joy and Progress despite Challenges

Dave's update 

"This trip to Malawi was greatly encouraging.  The model farm (Hill Top) where we teach “Farming God’s Way” was a constant hive of activity during this trip.  We have almost 60 families that ‘share’ the land with us and many of them were harvesting their corn/maize at this time.  At harvest time the whole family is present to assist bring in the harvest and this is always an exciting time.  We were also helping folk de-cob their harvest at our “milling shed” and this was a pleasure to see (as we now have electricity again after an almost 5 month interruption due to vandalism).  Their joy at having their harvest de-cobbed in an hour or so as opposed to months of rubbing the grain off with the fingers was clear to see.  We ask for a small payment to cover the electricity and maintenance of the machinery. The harvests this year have been reasonable compared to last year as the rains were better.  

We have harvested our first planting of Soya beans and this is drying in one of our sheds.  The later Soya and the peas are still in the ground and are looking good.  A little more rain is required to bring them to conclusion.  I look forward to seeing this harvest in July.  The entire farm is under cultivation by someone and that is most encouraging to see.  Weeds are still proving to be a great challenge but we are hopeful that the next 2-3 years will see us victorious and weeds becoming less and less.  

Our 6 pigs are doing very well.  They look healthy and fat.  Hopefully we can start breeding in the next few months.  We have purchased another 9 piglets which should arrive soon.  We will separate the piglets from our pigs for 2-3 weeks just to make sure they are not diseased.  Disease has decimated most of the pigs in the area with very few remaining.  An orphanage near us, which had over 200 pigs, lost them all.  We are very grateful that we have survived thus far !  

We have started an organic compost manure project to produce our own compost manure.  All the superfluous organic material from the farm and surrounding area is gathered and heaped up.  We then build structured heaps using the organic material, with layers of chicken manure and lots of water.  The whole ‘square’ begins to heat up and rot.  The square is turned 8-9 times over a period of months until the organic material breaks down.  The heat also kills off the grass and weed seeds in the mix.  We plan to use the compost manure for our planting stations and we hope to sell some compost manure as well.  

We also initiated our own little earthworm farm, using our pig manure and organic material from the farm.  I brought in some earthworms from my home in Cape Town in an ice cream tub inside my suitcase and we have seeded them into their new home.  The worms did not appreciate being placed inside the aeroplane hold and did not look too happy when I looked at them after their trip.  Nevertheless, it looks as if some have survived the trip and they should start breeding soon :)  I would be happy if we can put all our pig manure through the worms to give us large volumes of earthworm castings.  With harvest season now upon us we should also be able to get much of our pig food from the shelling process at our mill. (cheap feed for our pigs) 

Down in the valley our friends had endured another flood.  It appears as if the river has determined to alter it’s course each rainy season to regularly flood the area in which our folk live.  What used to be a once in 10-15 year flood is becoming an annual event.  Once again the water lapped at Frank’s house and caused the loss of the rice and maize crops.  Both have been replanted and we are hopeful of a reasonable crop in the next few months.  To be sure farming is becoming a more difficult pastime and seasons seem to be more unpredictable.  Despite these challenges we estimate to have enough food for the 42 orphans until September / October but there will be some challenges in the hungry months over Christmas through to harvest time in March / April 2014.  The orphans looked well nourished and happy :) A visitor donated $500 to buy food now whilst it is cheap as prices will rise sharply come year end.  Frank is looking at relocating to higher ground closer to the main road.  He will move the orphans too.

Whilst in the valley we visited 2 adult literacy schools that we helped initiate.  The plan is to start another 2-3 classes in other areas in the valley this year to help the many folk, mostly women, who are illiterate.  We also have 2 schools running in the townships around Blantyre.  I was delighted to see some of the ladies, who were brave enough, reading off the blackboard.  What a moment :)  The smiles on their faces !!  

Back at the farm we are continuing to repair and restore the house and infrastructure. We installed a pressure pump on the house water supply to enable sufficient pressure to fill our solar geyser and to enable us to install an instant hot water supply to our recently installed shower in the “ladies room”.  We also built another 2 bunk beds and bought all the necessary mattresses and bedding to enable us to host us to 12 guests at a time.  We had 12 guests visit us from the USA and we just coped with the numbers.  They were a good team and were quite willing and able to cope with the different conditions to what they are normally used to.  Besides visiting and seeing all that we do this team also assisted us with training as we trained over 70 of our folk for a day at the farm.   Subjects covered included micro business, health and hygiene and even some basic engineering.

We continue to repair and upgrade our sheds and storage areas, repairing windows and doors, plastering and painting etc. Most buildings have had no maintenance for more than 20 years and so there is much to do.  We also need to increase our storage areas as production ramps up at the farm.  Security needs to be improved for our crop storage.  Poverty seems to be on the increase everywhere and so theft and crime is also on the increase.  The devaluation of the currency has increased suffering immeasurably. There are some quite violent armed gangs in the area who have caused much trouble, loss and personal injury to people, some of whom are our friends.  This has caused us to be on high alert and high prayer.  It is difficult to resist well armed gangs of 10-12 men when they have firearms and we do not.  Nevertheless we do our best and make our plans so as to best defend ourselves and our property.  The police are completely useless and most likely the source of the firearms so one cannot rely on them at all.

Despite all the issues we are not discouraged but, on the contrary, we are greatly encouraged at the progress that is being made."

Time to compost

Building a new compost manure pile with old organic material and chicken manure.
The heat generated kills off all old unwanted seeds present (like weed seeds) and leaves us with a good growing material.

The Decobber

Our decobber hard at work, decobbing for the folk who have cultivated land at our farm.  The harvest is reasonable this year.
Each farmer pays us 2 bags for the use of the land plus a small fee in cash or maize for the decobbing.

The farm becoming sustainable

Dave's update:

"I have just returned from Malawi.  Trip went well – farm is totally ready for the rains.  The guys have worked really hard again to be ready.

Maize mill is running and making some money – should pick up nicely after the next harvest.
Mushroom house is working well and sales are taking place almost daily.
Honey – we are down to 12 hives but do hope to harvest honey early in the new year.
Pigs – 35 died.  Foster suspects sabotage :(  We brought in our last 5 pigs now to try again.

I have sent you some pics of the latest.  We are fairly close to being sustainable now, in terms of our security and staff costs, and basic maintenance and electricity etc."

The pictures from the top: Black mamba on the farm; the maize mill in operation; planting maize