Covenant College is situated on a 92 hectare farm 4kms from the tarmac road and 16kms from the town of Petauke. The Farm Ministry Leader with his team manages the farm to provide the various needs of the College and other ministries. The majority of the food for the students menu is produced on the farm. The farm also provides an environment for training the students in agricultural principles, as part of their course at the College. These are the main ministries of the farm but it extends to providing teaching to subsistence farmers in the Petauke region and a ‘work for food’ programme during the months from November to April when many of the local people are short of food. The harsh conditions in Zambia make farming difficult mainly due to the long dry season. Normally the first rains start during October and the first big rains in November. In a good season these continue until sometime in March when the rain stops and the seven month dry season starts in which there is no rain at all.

Phil Bailey, from England, is the Farm Ministry Leader and he is ably helped by Bilison Mwanza, Farm Manager and Samuel Mwale, Farm Supervisor. Both Bilison and Matthew live on the farm with their families.

Livestock Units

The training aspects of the farm include livestock units set up to show small business opportunities. These presently include pigs, goats, cows, chickens, rabbits, ducks and guinea fowl. From these we show how integration between animal and crop production can be utilized, such as the harvest of the manure for fertilizer on the field crops and the crop fodder for supplementary feeding of the animals. The housing/kraal keeping of livestock shows the advantage of providing minimal husbandry to give an increase in production and therefore a more regular supply of meat and protein to provide a better diet.

Farm Garden

The farm garden is irrigated via a drip irrigation system, this is mainly for vegetable production for the college but is also a place where we trial potentially helpful crops and plants. These include the introduction of new vegetables which are less resistant to diseases and pests and produce well in the local climate. There are also fifty coffee plants from which we are producing small amounts of coffee for our own use and as production increases also for sale and therefore a suitable ‘cash crop’ for locals to implement. Various herbs are grown for culinary purposes and to act as natural pest control. Artemisia has been grown successfully which, when the leaves are dried and drunk as a tea can be used to prevent malaria. Trees are planted such as Moringa which has highly nutritious leaves, Jatropha which is used as ‘living’ kraal fencing and also the fruit oil for bio-diesel and various fast growing agro-forestry trees which have nitrogen fixing qualities, supply fodder for the animals, pole for fencing and wood for burning.

Farming God’s Way

FGW is the main teaching programme provided to the students and local farmers and fully implemented in the field crops of maize, cotton, ground nuts and sunflower on Covenant College farm. FGW is not so much a method of farming but a way of life in Christ expressed though farming. It incorporates good husbandry practice, technical crop production and a basic knowledge of soil science with a biblical application throughout to the way one should farm in African conditions. FGW shows that the bible teaches us to be ‘self-sufficient’ where possible as opposed to waiting for ‘hand-outs’ and therefore the only real way out of poverty is to be faithful with the ‘talents’ God has given, however small they maybe, and that He will bless those that follow this way and even ‘give an increase’.

For more information on FGW please go to www.farming-gods-way.org

Work for Food Programme

The ‘rain season’ maize is harvested during May once the crop is dry and this needs to be sufficient to provide food for the family for the next twelve months. However due to the generally poor harvests people start to run out of food from October. It’s at this time farm work at Covenant College starts to increase as we prepare the land for the next planting season and therefore we provide work, for whoever is willing, in exchange for maize. This continues throughout the rain season as the ten hectares of field crops needs regular weeding and when harvesting begins there is much work to be done. The majority of the maize produced on the farm is for this purpose as is much of the cassava crop.

Hammer Mill

The hammer mill houses machinery which grinds the maize corn into maize flour. This provides a service for the local people and the college as well as providing an income to supplement the funding of the farm ministries.

Details of these and other projects can be found by following the links below or in the sidebar.