Poulty project in Usureka

We have just left Usureka, Tanzania where we were working on the VWB poultry project. There are two aspects of the project that we were involved with. The first part of our stay in Usuerka involved going to the local high school: Ilima Secondary school. We spent a couple of days teaching the children about poultry husbandry and what would be involed when they are raising the chickens that will be donated to them. The building of the chicken coup is almost complete and it is expected to be finished soon. It will be up to the children (orphans) to raise the chickens and sell the eggs that they produce to help pay their school fees. Out of 500 students, 200 of them are orphans. While we were there we were talking to one of the teachers and the head master about starting a lunch program for the orphans. Many of them leave their house early in the morning, attend school from 7-2 and then make the treck home all without eating anything all day. The teachers say that it is hard for the children to focus when they are so hungry. We purchased large cooking pots and plates to start a small pilot lunch program. We are starting with only 10 orphans, but the goal is to get the community involved and to donate some maize and beans for the children to eat. Kaye, one of the project co-ordinators, is going to go around to the community and try to get some support from them.

We also went around to the local farmers in Ilima and conducted a survey regarding the success of their chickens from the project. So far many of the chicks have been dying at a young age (suspected from Newcastle's disease) and the ones that have survived are not old enough to start laying yet. The challange seems to be with having access to the Newcastle's vaccine to vaccinate the chicks early in life. We are hoping to get a villager invovled in providing this service to the farmers.

Our experience in the village has been a very positive one and it seems like most of the people are eager to learn more about poultry husbandry. Some more access to resources and knowledge would greatly benefit the farmers in the future.