09 Nov 2014

The Department of Forestry and Range Resources (DFRR) recently held a workshop for the poverty eradication beneficiaries in order to provide them with valuable information in selection and management of projects.

Speaking in an interview, the chief technical officer, Mr Moffat Ntesang said DFRR had an obligation to aid its stakeholders to understand the underlying principles of poverty eradication programme in collaboration with the office of Social and Community Development (S&CD).

He said so far 11 projects had been approved, three in Tonota North, five in Nkange and three in Nata/Gweta constituencies, while eight were under production and three were waiting packaging.

Mr Ntesang explained that they got a list of beneficiaries from the S&CD office and then they organizsd an awareness workshop where they taught them about different projects and provide all the necessary information so they could  choose wisely. 

He noted that the workshop’s other aim was to provide valuable knowledge of technical and business management to their stakeholders, to equip them with basic information on how to produce seedlings and to ensure implementation of approved projects .

Furthermore, he said projects to choose from included backyard tree nursery, landscaping, phane, thatching grass and making fire beaters.  He said after the workshop, they provided the beneficiaries with different equipment looking at the projects chosen. 

Mr Ntesang said that under the backyard tree nursery, they also provided water connection and a 5000 litre water tank to the beneficiaries.  They also visited the beneficiaries to assist them on how to plant, give advice on which trees to plant looking at its duration of production and market.

Mr Ntesang stated that those who chose phane were given equipment to go and harvest phane then sell it to earn a living . 

He said that they visited them to see how they were doing and also adviced on places to visit where there was a lot of phane to harvest. 

Under fire beaters project, the beneficiaries made fire beaters out of car tyres and wood sticks then sell to the Fire department and farmers who used them during veld fires. 

He said those who chose thatching grass cut the grass and sold it mostly to lodges and in landscaping, the beneficiaries were given garden tools, lawn mowers, manure and seedlings to plant flowers and lawn for other people. 

Mr Ntesang noted that this project was more profitable as one major landscaping job could be done at around P3 500 and maintenance projects at P300 per project. He said that there was less competition as there were few landscaping companies in Botswana.

He mentioned that most people opted for backyard tree nursery but they continued to encourage them to choose other projects to avoid having to compete for customers with other beneficiaries.  He also encouraged people to come forward and register for poverty eradication programme. ENDS