JB continues with ‘one goat/cow per poor family’ in Malawi

The Joyce Banda Foundation International (JBFI) at the weekend witnessed the transfer of tens of goats from initial beneficiaries to new ones at Kanono Village in Traditional Authority (T/A) Saimoni’s area in Neno district.

Under the one goat/cow per family programme, JBFI provides cows and goats to families and that the beneficiary families or groups breed the livestock and pass the offspring on to new beneficiaries as a ‘revolving’ programme.

The initiative is implemented by Market Women’s Activities in Development (MWAI), a branch of the Joyce Banda Foundation International that was started 2010 to empower local Malawian women.

MWAI Women has 400,000 members and empowers women to become financially independent through saving circles, business training, and other empowerment activities.

On March 24, 2014, MWAI women provided over 55 goats to about 60 women in Neno’s T/A Saimoni area. Today, the figure has risen and over 150 women have benefited and many more are slated to benefit from the initiative in the next couple of months.

The event at the weekend was to officially handover the offspring goats to new recipients, according to Rosemary Nhlema, MWAI’s National Chairperson.

Nhlema said that the initiative in Neno followed a request by the women around this area to benefit from the MWAI different initiatives, including the provision of livestock.

“They had heard it from the radio about our existence and empowerment programmes; they immediately took an initiative to contact us for assistance,” Nhlema told journalists in Neno.

She added that it is the wish of the founder of Joyce Banda Foundation International and former Head of State, Joyce Banda that MWAI reaches out to as many women and households as possible so that lives of people, especially women and the youths improve for the better.

MWAI currently has over hundreds of thousands of members countrywide.

Ireen Kamchunjulu, MWAI Regional Coordinator (South) said that the initiative has many economic benefits that the families and women will enjoy.

She cited the milk meat, which she said would improve their protein consumption and that they would also sell some of it for monetary benefit. She also cited manure that would improve their agricultural productive as another important advantage of rearing these goats.

Village Headwoman Kanono thanked JBFI for the initiative, which she said had significantly improved livelihoods of his subjects. She asked JBFI to introduce other initiatives so that many people in her area are economically as well as socially empowered.

JBFI was founded in 1997. The Foundation established the MWAI and Youth Movement in Development (YOMODE) to empower women and the youth, respectively, in markets and in informal trade.

The Joyce Banda Foundation through MWAI provides social support network for local women entrepreneurs; builds capacity of local women in community leadership; provides HIV and AIDS information, counselling and support to women in need; and facilitates and identifies market opportunities for the poor and marginalized women doing business.

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