Pastor Mambu Takes Pulpit To The Farm
The only Sierra Leonean pastor to embark on large-scale farming is harvesting his five-hundred-hectare rice to promote the nation’s staggering food sufficiency drive.
The Faith Healing Agricultural Project farm which is Sierra Leone’s second largest – after Kella’s in Tomabom, is located in Yainkassa village in the Makarie chiefdom, Bombali district, about hundred kilometers northeast of Sierra Leone, where the parboiled rice is being packaged in 25kg for 175,000 Leones (about $17) and 50kg for 350,ooo Leones (about $35) per bag.
“With a population of seven million, the Government of Sierra Leone yearly spends about two-hundred million dollars on importation of rice – the country’s staple food”, said David Sellu Sallu, Bombali District Agricultural Officer who witnessed the launch of the harvest.
Pastor Francis AM Mambu who doubles as general overseer of Faith Healing Bible Church – Sierra Leone, is CEO of the Faith Healing Agricultural Project. He said over the years, the farm project has been supporting four-hundred and fifty local women comprising six farmer-groups from six villages including Royeama, Maronko, Royanka, Woreh-Yeama, Yainkassa and Gbom-Samba, “beyond seedlings and tools”.
He noted that in less than two years, cash deposits of ten million, five-hundred thousand Leones provided for each farmer-group (about $1,500) in a form of micro-finance scheme to succor individual family needs have eventually accumulated between thirty to sixty million Leones (approximately $3,000 to $6,000).
Pastor Mambu was awarded Sierra Leone’s Food Security Ambassador by Africa Agric Links in 2019. Poised to fully take the pulpit to the farm by extending the project to all districts across the country for food sufficiency, the Man of God noted that “the venture requires maximum support.”
The preacher-farmer remarked that plans are underway to construct a center for rice milling in Yainkassa, by November this year, as well as ‘Bombali gari’ – a product from processed cassava.”
He expressed appreciations to UMC Reverend Steve Harman, Ken Royal Foundation and Bread and Water for Africa (BWA), for supporting in kind and with few machineries during commencement of the project some years ago.
Chief of Yainkassa – Abdul Koroma and Zainab R. Kamara – head of the women’s groups thanked the pastor “for not only making life better for us and our families but making the name of our village go international.” They called on the central government, local and international non-governmental organizations to support the servant of God “to have his dream come true.”
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