Info September 2018

Mantapala Refugee Settlement, Mansa Diocese, Zambia
The Refugee Livelihoods Project
(Continued from page 17) working on livelihood
projects with diverse
communities. The project activities will result in
refugees engage in sustainable crop production
The District Commissioner for the Nchelenge District, Zambia,
delivering his keynote speech during the launch.
and alternative livelihoods, have access to business
knowledge and credit for micro enterprise development,
and have access to viable market for
agro-products and non-agro commodities. The
activities that will produce the above stated results
in the lives of the refugees include:
1. Facilitating the election of 2 refugee volunteers
from each of the 12 refugee farmer groups to be
trained as Lead Farmers;
2. Training of refugee volunteers (Lead Farmers)
in agro-ecology (climate robust) methodologies
and other relevant basic extension skills;
3. Promoting agro-ecological (climate robust)
farming practices among refugees through
various skills training approaches, including the
Farmer Field School Approach (FFS) and
demonstration sites;
4. Supporting refugees with start-up revolving
inputs for crop production;
5. Promoting simple irrigation technologies in the
refugee settlement to ensure all year round crop
production;
6. Conducting training in seed selection and
multiplication of local seeds that are adaptive
to the local environmental conditions;
Caritas Africa Info: page/página 18
7. Conducting quarterly mentorship to refugee
facilitators (Lead Farmers) in facilitating basic
extension services to fellow refugee farmers;
8. Supporting refugees with revolving inputs in
establishing other alternative livelihood activities,
including small livestock rearing, beekeeping,
and fish farming;
9. Promoting food procesing,
preservation and value
addition for some cash
crops such as sunflower,
groundnuts and soybeans;
10. Facilitate savings and lending
schemes among the
refugee community in order
to enable them diversify
into other small business
ventures;
11. Conduct entrepreneurship
training for refugees;
12. Supporting refugee farmers
in establishing practical market linkages between
institutional buyers, established business
chains and promote innovative information
pricing system including use of mobile phones
for marketing;
13. Supporting refugee farmers to start bulking
their produce for better marketing bargaining
power.
All the project activities will be implemented
within 12 months, up to June 2019, but due to the
revolving and/or passing on system most of the
project activities will go beyond the life-time of the
project and this will allow more refugees, apart
from the initial project beneficiaries, to benefit from
the project.
The official launch of the project was graced by the
District Commissioner for Nchelenge District. Also
at the launch was Chieftness Kanyembo of the
Lunda people of Mwata Kazembe in whose
chiefdom is where the refugee settlement located.
Other notable people that attended the launch
include:
(Continued on page 19)