.jpg)
Key Person: Hanitra Andrianomanana
We spent a week visiting the Relief & Development team in Ambovombe, South Androy. We were accompanied by Moira Andriambelomanana, who assists Hanitra, as Hanitra wasn’t available to travel with us during the week. We were, however, able to spend a couple of hours catching up with her in Antananarivo before we flew out of Madagascar.
Over the past few years, the Discipleship Movement in South Androy has used the Goat Project as a practical way to open doors for sharing the Gospel in many remote villages. Whenever a village received goats through the project, a Christian cell group was also established. These groups originally met weekly to pray, worship together and share the Gospel, helping strengthen believers and reach others in their communities.
The area has been in drought since 2023, and the people are very desperate.
The political situation is in a custodial role until a new President is re-instated.
In 2022 BHW funds purchased 211 goats which were dispersed to 27 villages. After 18 months, each group were to return what they were given plus two goats. The first year the project was successful, but since 2023 the region has been in drought. Those responsible for the goats in some of the villages fell sick and the goat programme failed for a variety of reasons.
23 groups returned their original goats plus two, four groups didn’t return the goats and now won’t communicate with them, so this has caused problems in the ministry.
There are still nine villages with goats remaining after returning the originals. The other villages don’t have any goats as they sold their remaining ones to purchase water, pay for funerals and medicine, or the goats died from sickness or were stolen.
The goat bank has therefore now come to an end. The original goats, along with the two additional goats each village had agreed to return, have been collected and the funds raised were used to purchase land in Ambovombe for a future OM Training Centre.
After discussing this with Hanitra, she explained that the goat project had become increasingly difficult to manage, with goats being stolen, dying or not being cared for properly. She felt it was necessary to recover the goats before more were lost.
We visited the newly purchased property on the outskirts of Ambovombe. It is currently a bare section of around 200 square metres, but the vision is to develop it into an OM Training Centre as funds become available.
The remaining funds after purchasing the land were used to send 16 team members to Antananarivo for a week’s OM training and to repair Aviso’s motorbike, which he uses for ministry. He has also taken responsibility for maintaining the bike going forward, which is a challenge for him.
The team shared their disappointment that several villages had not returned the original goats as agreed. It also became clear during our visits that there were still some hurt feelings surrounding the return of the goats, particularly as many villages no longer had any goats due to theft, disease or other challenges.
Anajafy is from Anjatelo village, which has a population of more than 400 people in the surrounding area. Their group received seven goats from the project and later returned nine goats. With the support of her husband, she managed the goats diligently and carefully, and today the herd has grown to around 30 goats. The project has now become sustainable, with the group selling goats when necessary to cover vaccinations and other ongoing costs.
Recently, during a severe drought, the group sold five goats to buy water for all the Christians in the community, who then shared that water with others in the village. The Christian fellowship currently includes 15 adults and around 20 children, although some young adults have moved away seeking work.
In this village, everyone shares responsibility for caring for the goats, working together in several smaller groups.
Anajafy believes the success of the project is because of Jesus. She explained that their village faces the same struggles as every other village — hunger, thirst, and hardship — but they chose to honour the rules and work together faithfully.
She understands she does not have authority to take goats for herself, as the group holds one another accountable. Instead, they are focused on how they can continue growing the herd for the future.
People from other villages have noticed the positive changes in the community and the blessing the goats have brought. Many are now asking questions about their God and their faith. Looking ahead, the group said they would be very willing to share their experiences and encourage other villages wanting to establish successful goat projects of their own.
This project has resulted in a mixed response from the communities, as the villages with goats remaining are far more positive and hopeful than those who have no goats after the return of the original goats back to the Goat Bank. The communication and way the project was handled has caused some problems, but the team are fully aware of how they could have done better.
The Relief & Development team have learned many lessons of where they went wrong with the Goat project. The team reflected on their learnings and outlined these as follows:
- The villages that failed were villages that are very poor.
- If the leader is a Christian woman and her husband isn’t, then there is great pressure on her to give the goats to something else, e.g. funerals, food etc.
- If the leader doesn’t have a strong personality and a supportive spouse, then it fails.
- It’s not always the leaders who want to take advantage of the goats, but the village puts pressure on them to sell the goats and split the profits to help all.
- They need to choose leaders with more prayer and thought and identify them before the goats arrive in a village. They found it hard identifying the original 27 as they were accused of not loving others and showing favour.
- When it started, Aviso was a new team leader, and he didn’t know the village people – they feel this was one of their biggest mistakes. He now knows the village people well after three years.
- The lack of spiritual maturity of both the leaders and the team members didn’t help.
- After the project failed, they realised the importance of continuing to visit the villages to encourage and help them. The team meet every three months with any villages who still have goats.
- Some villages didn’t get enough kids from the original goats, and lost them due to sickness, so once they gave back the originals + two they had no goats left, so perhaps it should be a percentage of births that are returned – not a flat number.
- A change in mindset is needed to understand that the goats are a long-term resource not something to eat and is gone.
- When a group was given goats, there was only one person allocated to look after them with accountability to the team- the village often had no information and had no accountability. If they were to do again, they would split the goats so a few people in each village have responsibility and all have accountability.
- Financial education needs to be taught.
- When choosing leaders, they need to look for someone with a good relationship with God.
- They need to share stories and testimonies amongst the villages eg. After one village had lost a few goats due to sickness at the beginning of the project, they were dependant on the Lord and prayed for the goats – after that the goats stopped dying.
1) Some villages are still benefiting from their remaining goats from the project
2) Praise for the faithful team members who continue on
3) Prayer for restoration of some relationships as a result of the project
4) Prayer for the Relief & Development team, that they would stay focused and faithful to the work