I am delighted to be one of your readers and consider Pas à Pas a cross-roads of ideas!
Our organisation (APPI) looks after nearly 400 orphaned children and street children in two towns near Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo. We help them with education and practical skills. Since their problems are more social than educational, we have started a small income-generating project: breeding guinea pigs. We give the children three guinea pigs each – two females and one male to breed. They are given as a revolving loan.
After eight months, four of the first twenty children to benefit from the loan were able to buy themselves school books, clothes and shoes by selling half their animals. Now other children keep asking us when their turn will come, but our resources are limited. We tried a similar scheme with rabbits, but unfortunately all the 16 that we started with died from various illnesses. However, we hope to try again.
We hope other organisations may benefit from our experience and would welcome support from groups doing similar work.
Deo Kujirakwinja K-M, APPI, s/c Rev Jacques Balibanga Katambu, BP 3648, Kigali, Rwanda.