Enchipai e Kirisimas Enkop Osiligi (“Merry Christmas for a Promised Land”)

Soil4Climate Providing Christmas Gifts of Financial Aid to Regenerative Agriculture Champions in East Africa: Money Supports Emergency Hay Relief for Drought-Stricken Herds on Maasai Lands in Kenya and Tanzania and Equipment and Training for Agroforestry Projects in Malawi

December 25, 2021

Under the project title “Enkop Osiligi” which is Maasai for “Promised Land,” Soil4Climate is today announcing that it has given Christmas gifts of financial aid to three regenerative agriculture champions in East Africa. Two of these are Maasai herders and advocates of Holistic Planned Grazing representing communities in Kenya and Tanzania, and one is an agroforestry expert working with Chewa communities in Malawi.

All three recipients have demonstrated leadership bringing regenerative agriculture principles to their respective communities and amidst hardships of drought and poverty.

“These are the heroes of regenerative agriculture and it is our honor to stand with them,” said Seth Itzkan, Cofounder and Co-director of Soil4Climate Inc. “Our goal is to restore soil to help mitigate global warming. Nothing does that better than the Holistic Planned Grazing and agroforestry projects that these practitioners are pursuing,” he continued.

The Soil4Climate Christmas gift recipients are Dalmas Tiampati, Executive Director of the Maasai Center for Regenerative Pastoralism, working with Ildalalekutuk people of Kajiado District, Kenya, Nding'a Orkeyaroi, an independent regenerative grazing advocate working with the Emboreet Maasai pastoral community in Tanzania, and Pike Wa Sarah Ng'oma, an agroforestry expert and board member of Hope Ministries International working with the Chewa people in the Masumbankhunda in Lilongwe districts of Malawi.

“The funding directed toward Kenya and Tanzania is for emergency drought relief in the form of hay for starving animals. Animals are the lifeblood of the Maasai people, essential to their sustenance and culture. Programs for regenerative grazing will be ongoing and will eventually make the land more resilient to drought, but it will take several years for those efforts to have effect and, in the meantime, we need to make it through this devastating dry spell,” explained Itzkan. “The funding directed toward Malawi will support agroforestry projects. The climate in Malawi is much wetter than the Maasai lands of Kenya and Tanzania, and different practices are available.”

In Kenya, Dalmas Tiampati said, “We are delighted to receive this Christmas gift of funding for hay from Soil4Climate. Prior funding from Soil4Climate has already helped to keep the animals alive and we are placing the hay on the bare spots to help those areas heal when the rains return. We have received training in Holistic Planned Grazing and we are moving the animals in ways that will restore the soil. In our language we say ‘Enchipai e Kirisimas. Ashe oleng’ which means ‘Merry Christmas’ and ‘Thank you very much.’”

In Tanzania, Nding’a Orkeyaroi said, “We are grateful to receive this gift from Soil4Climate which we are using to buy hay for our animals in the Enkop Naboo community in Tanzania. The hay will help keep our animals from dying during this disastrous drought. In Maasai we say, ‘Ashee naleng, metamayana Ntai Enkai,’ meaning ‘Thank you very much. May God bless you.’”

In Malawi, Pike Wa Sarah Ng'oma said, “On behalf of the Board of Hope Ministries International, I would like to thank Soil4Climate for the generous support you have contributed to poor farming communities in Malawi … These funds have just come at the right time when the farmers are into rainfed agroforestry activities but the hardest part was to find a donor to support the farmers with inputs and other working materials.”
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Donations to Soil4Climate can be made on its website or via it’s fundraiser on Facebook
https://www.soil4climate.org/donate.html
https://www.facebook.com/donate/175816281356815/3161974584074274/


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