Global Food Initiative Supports Water Workshops, Farmer Training, Soybean Training



Grants from the Church of the Brethren’s Global Food Initiative (formerly Global Food Crisis Fund) support water workshops and farmer training in Burundi, and the attendance by a group from Liberia at a training event at the Soybean Innovation Lab in Ghana.

 

Water workshops

An allocation of $9,980 funds water filter workshops in Burundi. The grant recipient, Trauma Healing and Reconciliation Services (THARS), will use the grant for its Good Water for Burundi training program. Some 60 participants will be trained and equipped to build, maintain, and sell household scale sand/gravel bio-filters. Women from THARS trauma healing groups will be trained in one workshop, and men from the Batwa community in a second workshop. The grant will cover the cost of the workshops including meals, accommodations, travel, materials, and administrative costs.

 

Farmer training

An allocation of $10,640 funds training for farmers in Burundi, also carried out by THARS. The organization will use the grant for its Farmer Field School activities. The grant will be used for the purchase of seeds, fertilizer, training sessions, plowing, land rental, and administrative costs. This is the second year of what THARS is hoping will be a 5-year project. A previous grant of $16,000 was made to this project in April 2015.

 

Soybean training

An allocation of $2,836 will support attendance by representatives of Church Aid Liberia at a learning experience hosted by the Soybean Innovation Lab in Ghana. The participants are part of a larger delegation including six representatives from Ekklesiyar Yan’uwa a Nigeria (EYN, Church of the Brethren in Nigeria) and Global Food Initiative manager Jeff Boshart. Funds will cover airfare from Liberia to Ghana, meals, visas, and housing during the one-week learning experience.

The mission of the Soybean Innovation Lab is to provide the information needed for successful soybean development to researchers, extensionists, the private sector, NGOs, and others operating across the entire “value chain” from seed to final product. The work of the lab is underwritten by a grant from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and is directed by researchers from the University of Illinois.

 


Find out more about the Global Food Initiative at www.brethren.org/gfi


 

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