Mohammed Khatar is among a group of young refugees from Dafur, who were identified by the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK), for their innovative ways of farming along the lagga. The council gave the group a piece of land at the Napata center and bought them a water pump to enable them pump water for irrigation from their shallow wells.
During one of the home visits, NCCK found Khatar keeping pigeons. After some discussions he showed interest in rabbit farming.
NCCK supported him to construct a structure for the rabbits, and donated 4 of them in 2013. By June 2014 Khatar had a total of 38 rabbits at his home. He found it easy to rear and feed the animals, because of the easily available green leaves and vegetables from their communal farm.
The farm on the other hand gave this group of 24 Darfurians, huge profits that entirely changed their lifestyles in the camp. All members bought bicycles for their movement from the farm to their homes, students paid for their studies with one opting to buy a laptop to pursue e-learning, a course that he is still undertaking.
In September 2014 Khatar decided to quite rearing of rabbits after he sold all the animals to NCCK. The proceeds enabled Khatar put up a big shop at Kakuma three market, making him one of the biggest shop owners in Kakuma. Though semi illiterate, Khatar is a living testimony that hard work indeed pays regardless of your stature in society.
