Our speaker this evening was Peter Morin from the Rotary Club of Napanee.
Peter started the Africa Project by taking a 3 week trip to Tanzania soon after he retired. He met Rotarians John and Cora there in January 2011. Peter has worked with the them as technical supervisors for the programs that were running. One such project comprised of buying Chicken kits with 8 chickens and some operating equipment. To travel to the island the project is taking place on, you must take a 2 and a half hour ferry ride from the port city as well as a 1 hour motorcycle taxi ride to the village. The program lost their entire first shipment of chickens. Peter's local contact is striving to "eradicate poverty." The island's population is loosely 18,000. The island has a chronic issue with mono-cropping and as such the soil is spent.
The first section of the program was to diversify the crop rotation to ensure profitability. The second program is to implement the chicken raising program. The program has a plot on the island to experiment with soil rehabilitation strategy. The local school children came to help with the planting and all monies paid to the children went towards school supplies. There are currently 3 operating groups of 6 farmers which will be the seed mentors for the others in the community.
After a Q & A session, Peter was thanked for his presentation.