Donations
a

EN

EN

EN

news

about us

team

join in

contact

Shop

Donations
Returning from Africa with hope

Returning from Africa with hope

by | Dec 10, 2025 | info, mail, Plentiful Garden

Sometimes a journey takes you deeper than expected. That was certainly true of these three weeks in Africa, which were full of challenges, surprises, and moments of hope. Here is an insight into what I experienced.

Hello!

Yes, I arrived safely in Switzerland on Monday, November 17. As always, I returned with many impressions, and I would like to share a few of them here. If you would like more details or have any questions, just send me an email.

Africa remains turbulent, complicated, and yet full of hope! Africa continues to be plagued by real scourges and tragedies. Even a three-week visit and various encounters in just a few countries were enough to remind me vividly of scourges such as injustice, violence, counterproductive systems, political instability, persistent poverty, and an overwhelming sense of hopelessness.

My trip to Togo got off to a rather bumpy start when I suddenly realized at the airport in Kigali that the bilateral travel agreements in Togo were no longer valid. No more express visas at the airport. I had to apply for one immediately, and it took four days for the application to be approved.

But during that waiting period, I came down with a severe flu that felt like a mixture of malaria and Covid. Fortunately, I was allowed to stay with my sister in Kigali, and her family took good care of me. So the trip via Rwanda turned out to be God's plan. What a clear reminder of God's providence!

But when I finally arrived in Togo, everything went very well. The visit to a Togolese colleague in central Togo was particularly inspiring. One of his many tasks is to train future farmers. It was encouraging to talk to the seven young men who had just completed a nine-month agricultural course. They confidently showed me what they had learned about growing vegetables and fruit and raising small livestock. They presented plans for their planned microfarm projects. I had the opportunity to encourage them to analyze the market and plan well in order to make their microfarms profitable.

I saw so much potential and was once again impressed by the realization that they could make a difference in their home regions if they received the necessary resources to implement their projects. The kind of support they need is exactly what we at PLENTIFUL GARDEN want to provide.

When I returned to Rwanda a week later, I did the same with two men from the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Despite all the major challenges they face, they are motivated to train others and help them set up urban farming projects to feed their families, sell nutritious food throughout the city of Bukavu, and improve their livelihoods holistically. I hope that we can enable them to realize some of these dreams there in 2026.

My stay in Rwanda naturally gave me the opportunity to visit our small farm in the east of the country, where my brother and I were able to sow thousands of new seeds… seeds of pasture grasses and various multipurpose trees.

Many thanks to everyone who prayed for me during this whole endeavor.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

More than food – How discipleship changes hearts and fields

More than food – How discipleship changes hearts and fields

by | Sep 1, 2025 | info, Plentiful Garden

With our projects from plentiful.garden in Africa as mission work msd, we want to contribute to addressing needs and promoting inner change.

In many parts of Africa, food insecurity and a general lack of well-being characterise everyday life. Future prospects and a lack of resources are the main reasons why many young people migrate to already overcrowded and miserable cities in search of a livelihood. Added to this is a deep-rooted mentality of dependency, a feeling of helplessness and abandonment. For many, unfortunately including Christians, this means that they have to fend for themselves through deception and dishonesty. Does our Christian faith have answers to these challenges?

Since agriculture remains the least developed sector of the economy and is deeply connected to the gospel, our approach of “holistic discipleship” is very promising. That is why I undertook a long journey to Rwanda and Tanzania in March and April of this year.

Six weeks on the road is a long time. Including travel time, I spent five weeks in Rwanda and one week in Tanzania. The main tasks were to strengthen agricultural activities and start discipleship training for the permanent employees of our family farm in north-eastern Rwanda.

It was understandably somewhat strenuous but fulfilling work. In terms of practical tasks on the farm, I introduced the use of cover crops to restore the minerals needed in the soil and keep it cool during the scorching hot summer months. We planted around 300 multi-purpose trees around the farm. We looked after a quarter of a hectare of tomato plants. Vegetables such as tomatoes attract many beneficial and harmful insects as well as diseases. Caring for them using organic methods is not easy, but it is part of the plan. We planted almost 500 passion fruit seedlings. The hardest work involved digging the holes for the plants and the stakes on which the passion fruit vines will climb and hang.

Then came the most exciting part of the work: the start of the discipleship course for 10 permanent farm workers. The course is called ‘ Growing in Grace ’ or ‘ Gukurira mu buntu ’ in Kinyarwanda (Rwandan). The concept that we must grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ comes from 2 Peter 3:18. " But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory now and forever. Amen. ”

The core of the course is to understand what it means to be a child of God. This contrasts with thinking, feeling and acting like an ‘orphan’ or, more precisely, like a ‘spiritual street child’. Typical problems such as ‘defending oneself’, ‘grabbing things’ and other forms of unfaithfulness come from the fact that many Christians do not really believe that our heavenly Father will provide for them. They believe that it is up to them to provide for themselves by honest or dishonest means. And that is where our vision and the content of the course come in. With God, different principles apply and we are allowed to be genuine, adopted children.

The last leg of the trip was a week in Tanzania, where my brother and I visited ECHO's East African branch. This is a Christian organisation that has been working for over two decades to promote healthy and responsible agriculture in rural areas in order to combat hunger. It was really inspiring to see how many creative ideas they have developed or adapted. For example, in seed production, food preservation and converting agricultural waste into useful energy for households.

We are grateful to everyone who has supported us financially and with prayers, and who has expressed interest in funding micro-farm projects. The launch of plentiful.garden is already an encouraging step. Now it is a matter of continuing courageously and holding fast to the vision.

Bernard Bucyana