A Community Vet Spreads Health and Wealth in Tanzania

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Tanzania’s southern highlands are a place where smallholder dairy farmers often struggle to raise healthy livestock. Here, Zawadi Rastoni Mafufu finds a sense of purpose in his work as a community agrovet, providing low-cost animal health services to the region’s farmers, thanks to support and training from Heifer.

More than 60% of all Tanzanians keep livestock, but many, as smallholders, lack sufficient resources and technical education to care for their animals.

They also must grapple with the challenges posed by a changing climate, including drought, heatwaves and dry, degraded soil that yields poor pasture for their livestock. As a result of these factors, livestock often experience low reproductive rates, high mortality and high prevalence of disease. These issues have severe ramifications in a country as vulnerable as Tanzania, where 26 percent of the population lives below the poverty line and where malnutrition is still a significant health problem, making Zawadi’s services vital.

Heifer International’s 80-year history includes 50 years in Africa — starting with Tanzania in 1974. Since then, much of Heifer Tanzania’s programming has focused on helping rural farming families increase their standard of living through dairy production. This work includes improving livestock care through training in animal nutrition, shelter and biosecurity. Farmers also learn sustainable agriculture techniques, such as applying manure to fertilize crops; using crop residues — the stems, leaves and husks left behind after a harvest — to feed cattle; and implementing pasture plots for grazing, which can reduce soil degradation and erosion and improve grass production.

As a result of these trainings, smallholders’ skills gradually improve, as do their cows’ health, quality of life and milk yields. But these improvements take time and, as on any farm, issues still arise. Consequently, Heifer’s participants, like all farmers, still need access to people with deeper knowledge and experience in animal health. That’s when Zawadi and others like him step in.

Zawadi is one of hundreds of young people across Tanzania trained by Heifer’s community-based animal health service provider system, a global effort to strengthen local animal health services and create opportunities for young farmers and others to acquire the skills needed to provide animal health services in their regions, and earn income, as a result.

After participating in the training, Zawadi went on to become a community agrovet, a position that requires additional education both in the field and in the classroom and allows him to train other animal health workers, diversifying his income stream even more.

In Tanzania, community animal health workers and community agrovets typically serve between 23 and 500 smallholder farmers each, working under the close supervision of Tanzania’s district vet officers. The program is designed to amplify rather than replace existing animal health service providers, filling the gaps in remote areas where the government’s veterinary services have limited reach and the demand for animal health services has significantly outpaced the government’s ability to provide them. Now, the presence of community animal health workers and agrovets increases the reach and efficiency of services provided by the government.

“These service providers are essential because the government provides services, but they do not reach us,” said Daudi Kalumbete, a smallholder dairy farmer in Tanzania’s Rungwe District. “I give my opinion to the people of Heifer to continue helping us to increase the number of service providers because the government service providers are few. The breeders are many."

"Heifer staff helps us breeders overcome the challenges we are facing, such as udder disease, which affects us significantly in this district of Rungwe." - Daudi Kalumbete

“In the beginning, there were few professionals," Daudi said. You may find that the cow wants to give birth, but there is no professional to provide services, or the operator is far away. But, with our contact with the Heifer people, they always arrive on time to solve our problems. This gives a farmer motivation. The task becomes sustainable.”

Another smallholder in Rungwe, Maria Iloha Kibonde, agrees. “In the past, there were veterinarians, but they were very few. If you could have called him, he would have told you he was coming right away, but he didn't arrive on time.”

Zawadi’s work as an agrovet, he said, helps him help others, working with smallholders like Maria and Daudi to resolve issues that, to the farmers, are not only frustrating, but often seem insurmountable.

“I received the education that helped me and helped my community. After training with Heifer, I started teaching pastoralists how to farm better and solve various challenges. As a service provider in this community, I help them. If the cow is sick, I treat it. I visit the herders daily and ensure the herder’s livestock is safe. Before Heifer, pastoralists were raising livestock without adhering to the best animal husbandry principles. they were not paying attention to the cleanliness of milking, and thus milk was not even good enough. The farmers did not give the cows enough water."

"After Heifer came, the farmers began to experience changes. Farmers pay attention to what we teach them, and the milk increases." - Zawadi Mafufu

In addition to these benefits, the program has increased smallholders’ awareness of the need for better preventative care.

Local governments have responded, organizing vaccination campaigns and preventative parasite control exercises. The awareness has also led to even greater demand for animal care — when an issue arises, farmers are more motivated than ever to address it quickly. This means more work for agrovets and animal health workers, helping them earn what’s known as a sustainable living income, or the amount of money each person in a household needs per day to live a dignified life.

Some animal health workers have even opened shops to sell agrovet inputs, such as medicine and feed, further diversifying their income.

For Zawadi, working as an agrovet has brought multiple benefits. “Heifer has enabled me to get cows; without Heifer, my income would have been so low that I may not have been able to have a place to stay,” he explained.

“Heifer enabled me to find farmland, cattle and other livestock. I have also benefited from education. Education has helped me. I know how to farm, have good husbandry and adhere to the principles of good agriculture.”

For smallholder farmers who depend on raising livestock to feed their family and earn an income, the health and safety of their animals corresponds with their economic stability and food security. If their animals are healthy, it is more likely they can earn a living income, too. The benefits farmers and animal health care workers are earning — economic stability and increased food security — ripple out, helping their communities and local economies become more stable and resilient.

“Without Heifer, many people here in Tanzania would not have benefited, and our incomes would have been much lower. Our incomes have gone up because of Heifer. We have benefited so much. Before, we could not farm. Now we are farming, we have houses, and our incomes have increased.” - Zawadi Mafufu

READ OUR FULL STORY HERE

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