Future plans (2005-2007)

The current strategy at Hlekweni is to practise what we preach at the individual level, and to try over the next two-three years to sustain our on site service activities through self generating activities of our own. These are:

renting out housing on the property;
letting accommodation for courses and conferences;
making furniture mainly for schools and hospitals;
selling produce from the farm, which is currently being built up;
running short courses which help to subsidise longer courses; and
providing consultancy training services to other organisations.

Hlekweni has always taken training out to the rural areas and, in recent years, a number of activities have taken place in Matabeleland South. These include the distribution of 502 drip irrigation kits and training of the recipients, most of whom are new to small-scale farming. This programme has been enormously successful and sustained many families, enabling them to not only support themselves but also support AIDs orphans and the very sick, as well as providing some food for sale.

We have worked closely with agencies such as the Agricultural Extension Service (AREX) where possible, and great strides are made for the community where we are able to work effectively together. People have also been trained in food processing and many former trainees have participated in further training, focussing on life skills including better business practices, working with natural resources, and conflict resolution.

Our current hopes for the immediate future are:

to broaden our funding base to include some longer term partners with whom we can engage on development issues so that key aspects of the work can have some element of security;
to continue with improvements to the infrastructure;
to provide a Health Clinic for over 3000 people including local farms and increasingly close outskirts of Bulawayo. We hope to establish a small nutritional plant nursery in connection with the clinic;
to develop a long defunct library and add to the existing stock of books and education material (the premises are now complete and the books are being re sorted);
to make significant progress in implementing water harvesting measures at Hlekweni and in extension projects;
to start an after-school child care service;
to raise awareness of the developmental social and emotional needs of young children amongst people working on local farms and to facilitate their access to services;
to continue with the rehabilitation of the farm - fences are being renewed and fire breaks graded at present. We intend to grow considerably more vegetables ourselves using gravity- fed drip technology and to secure them from theft!;
to expand the market for new and existing Production Unit products;
to build on the reputation of Hlekweni in Matabeleland and the region with regard to training in practical skills and providing courses accessible to those without much in the way of personal resources;
to expand our services to Botswana;
to start a conflict resolution course - Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP);
to strengthen our organisational capacity to enable us to constantly improve our quality of service and respond appropriately to local and national needs.

In todays Zimbabwe, where for more and more people self-employment is the only option, Hlekweni is needed as much as it ever was. The organisation has a part to play in a climate in which respect for human dignity continues to diminish amidst increasing poverty and hardship exacerbated by the onslaught of AIDS.