BE A ZAMBIAN HERO- PLANT A TREE

The rate of deforestation in this country is ALARMING! We see evidence of land burning and trees being cut everywhere. The question I heard a missionary raise lately was, ‘I wonder if anyone is planting trees to replace them?’ The question stuck in my head. The likelihood of a trees being planted somewhere in my experience seems absolutely remote. It has been the hardest thing to try to teach people to value trees- why? Well because in a culture that doesn’t expect to reach old age they have never seen the value of a tree grow. Never appreciated the shade a planted tree has brought. In a culture where everything is about surviving today, a tree that will produce fruit 6 years or shade in 10 years is just too low on the priority scale to notice. I came up with this slogan and I want to make it into a t-shirt, ‘be a hero plant a tree.’
I don’t just want to plant a tree though. I want to plant 1000 trees. 1000 trees in the next 2 years. This year’s goal is 500, next year I want to have started a nursery to plant the rest. You can see the pictures of the farm where we are developing. I notice 1 thing……where are all the trees? When I see people wilting in the hot sun I think, ‘where are the trees?’ When I see a malnourished baby with a distended belly just outside our gates in a country that has trees that can produce fruit 365 days of the year, ‘where are the trees?’ I want to pack every available space with a tree, for soil conservation, for shade, for water retention, and for fruit! A tree costs $3. Help me plant some trees, buy the whole orchard and I will name it after you. The nursery that we begin this year will become a seedling bank and enable us to get trees to vulnerable families.

100 orange trees
100 banana trees (300 more next year)
100 papaya trees (which will produce fruit this year)
50 mango trees
30 avocado trees
50 guava trees
70 ornamental trees (maybe some grapes if I can find them)


Donate Today: click here and designate for John and Ruth Kerr c.o. community development project.