Soroti Agriculture and Bible Studies

By Sara:

The Pentecostal Assemblies of God Soroti Development organization invited me to train some of their pastors and other church leaders in Bible study and agriculture, specifically conservation agriculture.  They brought a pastor and another leader from many different areas in Soroti and Serere districts together and I led them through a few Bible studies and taught about caring for our land and crops.  I always appreciate studying the Bible as a group before I teach about agriculture because there are connections between the principles we learn from the Bible and then the practices we do in our farming.

Since I hadn't known who was invited, I was pleasantly surprised to meet people I knew at the training.  It was fun to reunite with them after several years.

Innovations in Toroma

By Sara:

I continue to be amazed by the innovative ways the farmers I meet with in Toroma apply what they learn about agriculture and from Bible study.  All the members of this group wanted to show off what they are doing, so we planned a day to have a Bible study together, but then to go around the area and visit some members to see what is going on at their homes.

Since we studied God's creation of all kinds of plants and the Garden in Eden, the group agreed it was important to plant trees.  The started planting trees even though it was the dry season and the trees are doing well!  They made an effort to dig huge holes, fill them with manure, compost, and lots of water when they planted and then covered the trees with thorny branches to protect them from animals:

Some people protected their tree seedlings with a brick structure instead:

We went to visit one gentleman who is using discarded plastic bags (from cooking oil, yogurt, etc.) in place of the black plastic bags people usually buy for starting tree seedlings.  The group was excited to see this creative use of rubbish to save money.

Many people have also been inspired to grow vegetable gardens so they have fresh greens to eat during the dry season: