Know your market: Lessons from Blessed and Beautiful Farms

So you've also mentioned that it's a mixed farming enterprise.

And as I was, you know, gathering some information about the farm, I've seen that there's a livestock enterprise, horticulture, poultry, as well as dairy.

And I know for a lot of our farmers, you know, finding that balance when it comes to managing mixed enterprise can be very tricky.

How have you found a balance or how are you finding balance perhaps? Maybe some of the tips that you have that you could share.

They always say, well, if you want to eat an elephant, you need to take it bite size.

But I also believe that you can't eat an elephant alone because

you need

at least one or two hands to be able to navigate through the killing of the elephant.

So first it was just myself and my husband were just doing the crop and the planting.

And then we realized that there was a lot of demand because we just wanted to see the If this dream was really what I thought it was, and then from there on, I just began to have conversations with the people and also just to see what are the challenges.

I think I've already mentioned the fact that the transport is an issue and accessibility to good food is also a problem as a result of that.

So that's why...

We now brought in the poultry and then also the livestock.

So in terms of poultry, we are actually kicking off now.

We've just been on the stages of getting people to be able to get chicken.

For now, we are diversifying into making eggs as well.

And then the livestock that we are currently working with now, It's just the smaller ones, your sheep, goats, and then pigs.

Well, our plan is to be able to go more into cattle farming because with cattle, you can do so much.

You can, you know, do agri-processing, milk, yogurt.

I always say if we can be able to read these labels properly, where it shows where the stuff is manufactured and all you see is in the caves.

Why can't we have our own from our backyard, from our plant to the people within the village? So the important thing for me that I've learned is that just know when you need to cry out for help and allow people to help you.

Because sometimes we get so weighed down wanting to do everything by ourselves, which hinders the progress.

So We worked with some part-time local people to help us with the planting, the tilling of the land on the bigger farms.

And then I just have also one or two people that help as well from day to day basis.

The important thing is just knowing when you need to cry out for help.