Blog, Mission Possible, Oct 2016. Goats And Bees, The Keys To Prosperity
Providing livelihoods and the opportunity for people to become self-reliant is one of the most effective tools in overcoming poverty. As part of their deployment, the Mission Possible volunteers in Tanzania distribute livestock and help beneficiaries set up their own income-generating ventures like beehives, tasks they achieved even if for Kashfa Arfan it meant confronting her fear of - goats!
Today was the day I was dreading…THE GOATS. We were asked to choose 30 goats between 15 beneficiaries.
The beneficiaries were already nominated based on those who were in need the most. Our mission was to grab a goat by the leg and tie a rope around the neck.
Hell yes, I was scared. We went on to the field and as expected the goats ran away, bleating. My team mates were warriors. They caught them so easily.
Me, on the other hand, couldn’t stop running away from them. I wish I had more courage and caught them all.
But I did try my best. After tying them all and distributing them to the beneficiaries we moved over to the beehives. We spoke to existing beneficiaries of the beehives to find out their progress. They said that although they have received some benefit, they are struggling to find buyers of the honey and asked us to give them some more help.
Nasira, being the stern one as she is, told them that our plan was to initially help them with the start of their business and it was their duty to make it grow and find their own buyers by going out there into the city and selling the honey. Once they understood that would help them, they agreed they would do so.
We then headed over to our new beneficiaries and had a discussion with them.
They were all so very pleased and thankful and explained to us their plan and showed us how the beehives are created.
We created a few ourselves and had the opportunity to tie one up on the tree.
It was so interesting to see the technique used to create them. We started with washing the wooden lid and the wooden rectangle box and then fired a specific piece of wood in a metal pan which created sweet smoke that would absorb into the wet box and attract the bees.
We used thin slices of wood to pour in hot wax which also attracted the bees. Once that was done we sealed it in place with the lid and it was ready to be hung up. Kamran and Rahul headed up to tie it in front of the whole village. Rahul was the courageous one and dangled over the branch with bravery and tied it up without a problem. Everyone was super impressed even though it is a task they were all so used to but new to us.
The day was a very interesting day as it was the one I wasn’t looking forward to but I’m glad I got the opportunity to help start the locals’ businesses with the goats and beehives.
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