Page 2 - The Daily Builder - Day 15

caught the eyes of the Heifer
team overseeing the project she
belonged to, the Sustainable Dairy
Enterprise Development Project.
Flora was chosen as a trainer of
trainers in her group, one who
would pass on her knowledge
within her community and
beyond. All year round, farmers,
extension workers, international
development workers, and many
others visit Flora’s compound. She
spends countless hours teaching
and training, selflessly passing on
all that she has learned through her
Heifer teachings and through her
own hard-won knowledge.
Though Flora loves teaching
others from around the world,
she has given the most to her own
community. Aside from passing
Within one year, Flora Uwera lost her home, her property, and her husband. She spent years barely scraping by
until she received a heifer from Heifer International—then everything changed. on three calves to other families in Flora spends much of her time passing the gift by teaching other farmers
need, Flora recognizes that many what she’s learned, and helping them get better prices for their milk.
local farmers can’t afford the
Post Program, huge success membership fee for the nearby milk the larger cooperative, covering it of the Heifer model: every gift is
cooperative, which would give all under her own membership, so multiplied again and again.
them better prices on their milk that the 70 other farmers are given After generations of living
By Worldbuilders like this. Her home and property though she always chose to keep and make it easier to sell. To help far more benefits than they could in poverty, Flora and the other
were destroyed in the 1994 war half of the milk produced by her out these smaller farmers, Flora receive on their own. families in her community have
Flora Uwera stands before in Rwanda, and her husband died cow: she wanted to keep some started her own little cooperative: The Sustainable Dairy Enterprise found security. They have found
her farm, which looks a little a few short months later, leaving of it for her children, because, as 70 farmers come to her home Development Project ended in their motivation, and their self-
something like a greenhouse Flora on the verge of poverty as she she said, “they had gone so long every day, bringing with them a 2004, but farmers like Flora worth. They have found hope.
garden. Plants grow everywhere: a struggled to care for her children. without proper feeding.” Though total of 66 gallons of milk that they continue to improve their lives
wide variety of vegetables, herbs, She worked as a subsistence she could have earned more money split between ten-gallon milk cans. and Pass on the Gift to others in Thanks to Heifer International for
and fodder trees, with beans and farmer, but this barely allowed her by selling more milk, she refused Flora then delivers this milk to need. This is one of the hallmarks letting us share Flora’s story
small watermelons climbing family to scrape by. to compromise her children’s with you.
her hand-built trellis. Flora has In 2003, Flora received a heifer nutrition. Seventy-five percent of Rwanda’s land area is utilized
turned her home and land into a from Heifer International, and this Since 2010, Flora says that her Rwanda by the numbeRs for agricultural activities, making agriculture the primary
demonstration farm, sharing her marked the greatest turning point family’s meals have included The development strategies implemented after the 1994 economic activity. Seventy-eight percent of the country’s
knowledge and skills with farmers in her life. beef and eggs once a week, genocide resulted in a 12 percent decline in extreme hunger population relies on agriculture for their livelihoods, and yet
from all over the country, Africa, She learned to integrate dairy complemented by a year-round and poverty between 2006 and 2011 according to the United this is the group most affected by poverty.
Almost 7.5 million Rwandans still survive on $1.25
and even other parts of the world. and crop farming into her family’s supply of tubers, fruits, and a Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Improving or less per day and about 12 percent of its children are
agricultural productivity at the household level was, and
Her success is a shining example life, and growing vegetables variety of vegetables from her own still is, a priority of the Rwandan government’s Economic malnourished. It is rated 151 out of 187 countries on the
of the Heifer model. became Flora’s passion. She garden. Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy. United Nation’s Human Development Index (2014).
But Flora’s life was not always was able to sell milk for income, Flora’s success and passion

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