Well, when I left Niger, my plan was to keep my blog not only updated ...but to bring stories of the last few years that I never had time to post. It is funny how time seems to just take a different form here in Canada!
I have had a BUSY year ...not only did I spend my year roaming over the prairie soils of Alberta and Saskatchewan (through harvest beauty, winter snowstorms (including May 1 in Saskatchewan), and spring rains), but I spent the year in school at Ambrose Seminary as well.
It has been a wonderful year though: I have learned much through my classes that I can take back to my ministry in Niger and I have LOVED my time of ministry this year as I connected with MANY wonderful people. (More to come on a future blog post about this!)
But, all that aside – I thought this was a perfect time to update you on the story of the Harvest of Kongu 2012!! As I sit here and type, it is raining outside ...in fact, it has been raining almost non-stop it seems for the last month! (Though there have been wonderful sunny days in the middle.) I figure that the rainy season of Alberta is just preparing me to return to the rainy season of Niger!!
Rainy Season: A season of hope and sometimes despair in Niger. Last year, in the fields of Kongu – hope reigned! (and rained!!)
For those who need a reminder clue – my team organized agricultural training in the village of Kongu where I work. This consisted of a two-day program to educate the villagers on planting techniques and the introduction of a new millet seed which would mature faster and yield more than the traditional seed.
Stories of the training can be read here:
http://hopfinniger.blogspot.ca/2012/09/field-work-rainy-season-and-growth.html
http://hopfinniger.blogspot.ca/2012/09/field-work-trainingdistribution.html
The training days took place in May – the height of hot season. As we were out in the fields the days of these pictures, it was around 48 degrees!
The training finishing just in time for the month of June when the rains begin. As we distributed the new millet seed and fertilizer, my team and I knew that all was on the line dependent upon the rains.
The agony of farming and the hope placed in a rain cloud! No matter the outcome, the villagers saw that we came alongside them in their struggle: investing our time, energies, and funds to enter into their daily lives that hang in the balance of rain versus no rain.
But as we distributed this knowledge and the product – we prayed! Prayed that God our Father, creator of the world, would show mercy and shower down rain in the village.
His glory came – and the rains were abundant last year in 2012! His answer to prayer in a very tangible need. And the new millet grew.
(July)
(August)
Mid-September heralded the harvest of the new millet seed that we distributed!
A few weeks later than we had anticipated, based on the information we had received of the new seed, but 1.5-2 months earlier than the traditional millet seed!!
Though I would have loved to have stayed in Niger long enough to see the harvest ...my teammates relayed to me the villagers enthusiasm and joy:
“We have never before seen a harvest like this one!!”
It is such a joy to see God’s answer to our prayers – that He provided abundantly and beyond what we could ask or imagine!!
The best outcome to this has been the village now seeing the benefit of teaching and training ...that beyond simply just feeding them every year when their harvest fails, we together can walk a path of learning how to better the field production. Concern for the future improvement beyond the thoughts of just eating today.
Though the harvest in 2012 was abundant – I know that the struggle each year is far from over. It will take years of work to strengthen the millet production and harvest yield. And like farmers everywhere, all the hard work is subject to the elements of nature.
A fragile balance made more tenuous by the location of the village of Kongu: outside the green belt of Niger, located on the edge of the Sahara desert, prone to infestations of locusts/worms/birds, subject to the effects of desertification.
Our hope and prayer is that through the on-going agricultural training, this village will be able to improve harvest yields to the point where they can withstand better the shocks of drought and famine when they do arrive.
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