Reforming Families

Day Two of our trip out west landed us in Kisii, a fertile and densely-populated agricultural area near Lake Victoria. There, an organization dubbed BCHOS works with community members to increase their agricultural production. In coordination with CWS, the goal is wealth creation to enable persons to have a sustainable livelihood.

The HIV/AIDS virus has ripped apart many families here. Often only the young and the old are left to fend for themselves as they watch their parents and children whither away. Many efforts are being made to prevent the spread of the disease. However, if people do not have the means to combat their poverty, they will take desparate measures that put them at increased risk. For many young women, this usually means sexually giving themselves to men for pay. Even better or worse, arrangements can be made between a man and a women with children: that for continued sex, the man will support the family. This situation is hardly desireable and barely constitutes a family, but it exemplifies the dire need for economic opportunity for many people in HIV/AIDS-ravaged communities.

BCHOS is training people in agricultural techniques to show them how to increase production on their small plots of land. They provide a seed bank for farmers to buy seed at cheap prices and make it more affordable (and therefore less risky) to try out the new techniques. In addition, they have given a small amount of money to a few groups of women to loan credit to their members for certain business ventures. We had lunch in one of the restaurants one of the women had invested in with her share. The restaurant was little more than a small tin hut with some boards on logs as seating. Yet the woman was making her payments and saving the extra to pay for school fees and further invest in her business.

Hope still survives amidst the devastation, and I believe families will rise once again.