A couple of ideas have been coming my way. I am still waiting to hear from the man I talked to about working together on marketing the peanut butter to those in the diaspora. As I wait I am looking for a second vendor to work with.
The lady we leave our peanut butter with has been consistent and sales from a vending point, are proving to be better than the home deliveries we are working to establish. I guess we truly are creatures of habit, sales are being made more through a way that most people are familiar with. I am also going to approach a women's church guild and propose for them to buy peanut butter from me and for a certain number of bottles bought they get something towards any fundraising activity they have going. I had hoped to also work with one guy who works outside the country and every time he comes back home he donates to an orphanage, money that can buy them food for a short period. I thought instead of a yearly once off donation, he could put his money in the peanut butter business in the orphanage's name, meaning the orphanage will have stepped up in financial value, monthly they can then have peanut butter delivered to them throughout the year from their interest, this way the kids get to have peanut butter monthly for a whole year. In turn the peanut butter business will have acquired a sure customer which helps in stabilizing the business. I forgot to mention that Prisca's mother now grows more peanuts than she used to, because she has a ready client in Apo. Another uncle of mine has also grown peanuts as well. Apo's business is a backbone to key things. Providing income to people, driving farmers from making maize the central crop and potentially being a support and a ticket towards financial independence for institutions like orphanages that rely mostly on donations, by allowing their money to work for them longer. If most farmers close to my town supply Apo, it shortens the distance nuts would travel to get to Apo. In the past year, He would get nuts from Harare, that would have been imported from South Africa. This will also be an input towards reducing our carbon footprint.
I have had my concerns with the keyhole garden because it seems to attract pests. It's worse now because we have more kitchen waste than usual since we introduced more fruits and vegetables in our diet and this has increased the amount of organic matter we put in the kitchen compost. I looked at a bird on the tomato plant, picking on pests, also a bee on the pumpkin flower and I liked the picture I saw. The garden is not just for us but for animals and insects meaning I need to think of less harmful ways to make the place productive. Spraying pesticides will be my last resort, even to keep slugs away. The central part that I left for putting the kitchen waste is overfilling, so part of the space for planting is now holding the excess organic matter. When I learnt about how shells help keep slugs away and planted some seeds, there are two bottle gourd seeds that I put very close to where the excess kitchen waste is. I did not put shells around these but they are the only ones I covered with sand. I am surprised because of all the seedlings, these survived, from the slugs. The one that died, it was me, I accidentally snapped it when I tried to wrap the plants with a cover to protect them, an idea I quickly left. I am wondering if it's the sand or how close the waste pile is, that's keeping the slugs away from eating the bottle gourd seedlings. I will try putting sand when I plant next. I plan to plant grown seedlings that have a tough exterior as opposed to seeds this time. So I am nursing long Thai beans, water melon, and okra, away from the garden. I will transplant them when they are bigger. Maybe I will still be able to grow things even if there are a lot of slugs and other pests.
.png)
