Water is Life AND Cows are Life: Water is Life Kenya’s Livestock as a Business Program
Livestock as a Business member spraying cows for disease prevention
Water is Life Kenya’s Livestock as Business (LAB) program has been building on indigenous knowledge since 2011, with enormous success.
Each year WILK trains and gives microloans to organized trading cooperatives. Combining training with loans provides an opportunity for the immediate application of new skills. Improved incomes which come through better livestock management and drought resiliency provide positive reinforcement for long-term use of helpful practices like timely livestock disease prevention and control (e.g. vaccinations, deworming, control of ticks), performing simple livestock market surveys, timely buying and selling, budgeting and record keeping, grass conservation and management, among others.
The groups save or reinvest the money they make so that eventually they will no longer require loans from WILK. WILK takes the loans repaid by the groups and reinvests it into new groups who are clamoring to join this wildly successful project.
Results: More than 99% of loans have been repaid in full. Average net profit per group is over 30%. More than 320 group members and, by example, their families and neighbors, have learned valuable skills which directly impact their most valuable family asset, their livestock.
Impact: From these small seeds of knowledge and capital, great things are growing. The animals are healthier, have plenty of water and are well-fed. The members see improved value of their livestock, the main family asset, which provides income for food, water supply, shelter and clothing, schooling for children, and having the ability to take care of everyone’s health.
You can learn more about each group we work with by going here. Join us today to keep this project growing. We have a waiting list of groups that who are ready to join the project as soon as funding is available.
Each year WILK trains and gives microloans to organized trading cooperatives. Combining training with loans provides an opportunity for the immediate application of new skills. Improved incomes which come through better livestock management and drought resiliency provide positive reinforcement for long-term use of helpful practices like timely livestock disease prevention and control (e.g. vaccinations, deworming, control of ticks), performing simple livestock market surveys, timely buying and selling, budgeting and record keeping, grass conservation and management, among others.
The groups save or reinvest the money they make so that eventually they will no longer require loans from WILK. WILK takes the loans repaid by the groups and reinvests it into new groups who are clamoring to join this wildly successful project.
Results: More than 99% of loans have been repaid in full. Average net profit per group is over 30%. More than 320 group members and, by example, their families and neighbors, have learned valuable skills which directly impact their most valuable family asset, their livestock.
Impact: From these small seeds of knowledge and capital, great things are growing. The animals are healthier, have plenty of water and are well-fed. The members see improved value of their livestock, the main family asset, which provides income for food, water supply, shelter and clothing, schooling for children, and having the ability to take care of everyone’s health.
You can learn more about each group we work with by going here. Join us today to keep this project growing. We have a waiting list of groups that who are ready to join the project as soon as funding is available.
This video provides an in depth look at our Livestock as a Business program.