Big Hairy Audacius Goals

It doesn't take long to get back into the nitty gritty of life and work in Kosele. Our team have done a great job of managing everything while I have been away making it easy to pick up from where I left off in April.

This year is very much a 'suck it and see' time. It's exciting having the new farming and agriculture college initiatives under way and very encouraging to see the progress that we have made so far. The crops are growing well and the students are keen to get on. We set them the challenge of growing their own crops on some of small plots that we tried out our Farming God's Way approach on last year. They seem to have taken our offer of buying whatever they grow from them at market price seriously. I think they will be anticipating a good return for their work at the end of July when they harvest what they have grown. The spirit of enterprise is alive and well in Kosele.

This is just as well as the economy, as in much of the rest of the world, is in the doldrums. Our neighbours continue to struggle and unemployment among young people is rising. It has been interesting talking to Mary and Duncan, (our manager and farm manager respectively), about the difficulty of persuading people to take farming seriously – especially 'the youths'. Both Mary and Duncan have taken our agricultural projects to heart and are real evangelists for improved farming methods. Mary is carrying out her own experiments on the new piece of land that she has just bought and it would seem that there is a genuine interest in what we are doing in the community. As we develop our skills and confidence in what we are doing I really hope that we will be able to share our experience with our neighbours and help them to get more out of their farms.

Every time I come out to Kenya I seem to make new resolutions. My current goals include getting more sleep, not eating biscuits and drinking less sugary drinks, (lemon squash makes warm water a lot more palatable). Whether or not these goals are big, hairy or audacious enough, (to quote Jim Collins amongst others), remains to be seen but I'm going to give them my best shot. In the interests of the first of these I'm hoping to get to bed before eleven o'clock so will sign off now.