{Residents in Gakenke district commended girinka munyarwanda, aprogram started with an aim of reducing poverty and bring development to Rwandan Nationals over improving their livelihoods.}
Residents said they get manure to increase crop yields, drink milk to prevent malnutrition and selling surplus milk to earn a living.
Girinka program (One cow per poor Family) aims at enabling every poor household throughout the country to own and manage an improved dairy cow which would help the family to better their livelihood through increased milk and meat production and to improve soil fertility of their land for their crops using the available manure.
Leonica Nyirabikorimana from Muzo sector commended President Paul Kagame for initiating girinka, a program that has improved the lives of beneficiaries such as fighting malnutrition and poverty.
“I have been in abject poverty but with this modern cow, I will feed it and get milk in return. Besides milk, manure will help me increase my vegetable yields thus development,” said Nyirabikorimana
Another beneficiary Pierre Damien Bantegeye, from Janja sector confirmed that the cow will lead her to social development.
He said: “I have to change from poverty to a better life like others because I will be selling surplus milk.”
Dr. Ferdinand Mwumvaneza, in charge of agriculture in Gakenke district asked beneficiaries to take good care of the cows and fight poverty.
“It will please the authorities to see beneficiaries make use of the cows because if you don’t care for them, they will be taken from you and given to other vulnerable residents,” added Mwumvaneza
Since Girinka started, it has brought success stories to many Rwandans, pulling them out of defenselessness to glory and self-dependence.
Girinka has emerged as one of the home-grown solutions taken from traditional cultural qualities to eradicate poverty and successfully land the Rwandans into the Vision 2020 economic development
The country wide program is also hailed for its role in implementing unity and reconciliation among Rwandans, after the horrible 1994 genocide. When they donate the calves from the donated cattle, surely Rwandans are sharing and forgetting the past differences.
UMWOROZI
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