We finished our 7th trip to Africa by spending two great days in the Masai Mara (Kenya) talking about honey and cattle. For the past two years we have been exploring the opportunity to partner with a local bee keeper/honey producer and young couple who own 1,000 acres of land near the Masai Mara national park. We have spent the last few trips laying a strong foundation in trust and relationship but one of our primary goals for this trip was to move forward with a real business plan. After spending some time catching up with our good friends, we sat down and spent a few hours talking through all the details involved in building what we hope can be the leading honey producing company in East Africa. There are already 500 hives established and we created a vision for adding another 500 this year, increasing to at least 5,000 within four years. There is tremendous demand for consistent, high quality honey right here in Kenya, throughout East Africa and even on the global market. Needless to say this is a project that very much excites us because we see it meeting one of our goals of sustainability. What makes it truly exciting for us though is that this project will benefit over 200 families in the local conservancy; thus meeting our primary objective of generating jobs and creating an opportunity to share Christ with hundreds of people. Obviously we have a lot of work to do to make it a success but we are excited to get started executing our plan.
In addition to the honey business, we also spent time talking through a potential cattle business in the conservancy. The Masai people are known for their skill in raising cattle but they currently view the size of one’s cattle herd as a measure of wealth. The problem is this has led to severe over grazing and loss of income when their cattle die during times of drought. Our plan would involve helping the Masai learn how to properly control and manage their herd and create a much higher quality of beef for consumption throughout Kenya. As with the honey, our plan is to start small and build our way up but we feel both projects fulfill our business as mission and model and we are eager to get them started!
We are very thankful for another great trip to Uganda and Kenya. We have spent 8 great days here and head back home feeling like we accomplished several of our key goals. We also come back with some new opportunities and strengthened friendships. God has certainly answered our prayers and guided us each day. We give Him all the thanks and can’t wait to get home and keep moving these projects forward.
