Permaculture advocate in Zimbabwe - too little/too much rain

There are now 3 spaces I will be watching. In all the spaces, improvement in production is the only thing that will improve quality of life.

One: The plot, the change that occurred is the attitude  of the guardian of that space. She has a new found interest in agriculture. Because of this I have bought plenty of cow manure and a hose pipe to support the work that will be done. If the plot can generate some money to take care of people and give back the capital for the hose pipe and the manure, then we can look at the next growth stage.

Two: My home, where I now have time to start growing things. I was given chicken manure and I found a place where I can get some soil, to build small gardens with. I will use this place to experiment with mixed cropping, if it works I can show mai Kumbi, so that we can adopt this at the plot. I bought a fence to protect the garden from rodents, and the savings I can make through getting food from the garden instead of buying should give back money for the fence and provide income to grow to the next stage.

Three: peanut butter business, which has improved it's system. I will see if there is any improvement in the amount of peanut butter produced as well as in the attitude of the employees,  whose working condition has been made better, and if this will improve revenue. If there is a positive change, the next step in growth is to improve the salaries that the business gives it's employees, so as to reduce labor turnover. This depends on whether Apo sees it as a need or not.

A bunch of bananas is growing from a banana tree I was keeping for haversting organic matter. I would allow the tree to grow to a certain point and then cut it down a bit. I am overjoyed because if this bunch grows well, it means I can have bananas growing at a low level which is ideal, given I have the power lines issue.
I am also monitoring some pumpkin plant which I planted amongst the banana plants. The leaves look smaller than usual, but of all the pumpkin plants I planted, this one has had no disease and I am just watering it once in a while.

Then, one of my sisters who was around for over a week was in-between jobs. I am happy to say that time allowed us to be a support system for her and this period was not too bad for her. One thingI will include in this system, as I grow it, is that our sustenance should not take up every single second of our living time. We will intentionally make things flexible enough to make sure we can be there for each other when there is need. We had so much fun dancing mostly, it did not even feel like a low point for all of us. She is the one who supports us financially so knowing there was a way we were there for her also, was a very pleasant thing.

Apo went to buy nuts and he had to go to remote rural places, because where he usually buys nuts, there weren't any or they were pricey. It was hard for him to get transport for the nuts back to the center where he could then look for transport back to Gweru. He eventually managed to get the nuts to the center, but became it took him more day than he had planned, he had to rent a room for storing the nuts as he traveled back to manage the team he left back home. Once he has raised money for rentals, he will go back to look for transport to get his nuts back home.
His business has so many growth opportunities.

Hot electric motors, can a fan be incorporated on the shaft to cool the motor additionally.
Most electric motors have them installed?
Is the motor too small for the tasks? It sounds like it.

Travel distance for nut collection.
How far is Apo having to cart the nuts?

One of the motors already had a fan and the second one had a fan added onto it. This second motor had brakes and these were removed because there was a need for more power than is available to use it with it's brakes. It is now turning the drum but the speed is extremely slow and it's still being worked on. So there is still only one motor working.

Apo's trip this time, required him to travel 270km to a township called gawa. From Gweru town, he passes through a town called Kwekwe which is 60km from Gweru and then to Gokwe, which is 160km from Kwekwe and then to Gawa township which is 40km from Kwekwe. From there, he heard that nuts were found about 10-15km away from where he was and he walked this distance. When he did find the nuts he looked for a car to move the nuts to the township, the car guy did not turn up, so he then found someone with a donkey driven cart who brought the nuts to a certain point, I am not sure if the cart traveled 15km + 40km or just the 15km, but he ended up leaving the nuts 55km away from where he bought them.

For the time that I worked with Apo, I have since realised that we more often than not set ourselves to fail and it was difficult to put a finger at what the problem has been. It's not even just with Apo, but with all my projects. Two days back, I stumbled upon something that was differentiating strategy and planning and, I got my answer. Planning leaves no room for any external elements and my environment is filled with these. Between Apo and myself, I was worse, because he has so much experience.

I got to searching for the answer especially now because of an incident that happened. Apo needed to return some money which he had promised to have raised in the past month and he couldn't. I expected this because the motors took time that especially I, had not anticipated so I did ask for this money but I knew there was no way he could have raised all of it. When I did remind him of the loan to hear how much he could return he straight away threw me under the bus. I knew I had a large part to play in him not raising enough money because I pushed him to put motors. I felt his business was stuck at one level and unless he did something different he was going to be stuck at the same position until the business crumbled. What disappointed me was how quick the conversation turned to finger pointing. I already had his back, but for him to not raise a single cent towards returning the capital and blame it entirely on me was a little harsh. He was processing as he was working on the motors so he was selling some peanut butter and the time when he got the chance to go and buy peanuts, he still had peanuts to process, there was no time when he run out if peanuts. This is why I felt I did slow things down a great deal but there needed to be some accountability from his part that I still feel lacked.

Instead of going silent or being mad about this, I decided to understand how I felt and when I did get it, I called him and we communicated. I was in the same position as him where it was about being right and wrong, until I understood that if we change our approach and start including uncertainties and external elements, we will be more understanding, and for the times that we would have failed in our strategies, we can both be responsible and accountable  for it.

I sent him the link to the video for us to start talking around this topic. I hope we can get to discussing this, so that we grow together from this perspective.

Peanut butter is now available for our customers, whenever they request for it. This is a positive change that we are seeing.

The last thing I did was to send Apo a video and when I called him about the video, his answer was, I do not want to go back to school and this was before he even looked at the video. Hmm...I am not sure of how to feel exactly. I know what I want from all this effort it's a potential opportunity for both sustenance and fulfillment of my purpose. I have talked about the sustenance part in my earlier posts. As for my purpose;

Apo's project is at a level that has so much influence as compared to mine and it is also ready for some of the opportunities in the present time. From an angle of poverty reduction, if he works on his system, he will shift from so much movement, with very little production to a fully productive business and if he grows in profit, because of the relationship we are creating he has a higher chance of paying attention to my proposal with regards to how employees are paid. Without knowing, some of the salaries were continued from the colonial way of running things, where they had nothing to do with covering the employee's decent living costs. If he makes a sensible profit, he will benefit if he revisits this area. If he pays his employees well, he will reduce labor turnover and increase commitment. In my books he will be one owner added to our community who would have improved people's lives. Being a part of this development is what I was enjoying.

After his response I got to thinking about how much time I am putting into this and I am not paid for any of what I am doing (not that I am asking for this, but it crossed my mind). I decided to take a step back. When he called me he was telling me how the people he is working with are not working and their excuse is they have to watch the roaster when it is being run by the motor, so that it doesn't burn. I am now torn. Why is he calling me, it's his business, is kind of what I got from his response. The other side of me knows that I might not have an answer, but sharing takes away some load and who knows what change we can help to bring.
I don't know what to do.