Changes of a Woman in Muendi Community of Gudu Village in Sichuan Project
In early 2009, Heifer started a project in Gudu village, Chengbei township of Zhaojue County in Sichuan and assisted 20 women in establishing a Self-Help Group (SHG) in Muendi community of Gudu village. In a fair and open election, Ji Buguoguo was elected as the group leader.
Ji Buguoguo did not receive much education and could barely recognize a few characters. She was very shy and afraid of speaking in front of people. However, she actively participated in Heifer's training and assisted the project partner in training other project participants. Finally, she became a project trainer. Once in Heifer's 12 cornerstones training, Ji Buguoguo misinterpreted the cornerstone "passing on the gift" and was laughed at by the audiences. Since then, she seriously studied the meaning of the 12 cornerstones and after a few training sessions, she could recite the meanings of them all. In order to entrich villagers' cultural life, Ji Buguoguo also mobilized other women to form a female cultural performance team.
Knowing that other villagers had never planted lucernes as grass fodder before, Ji Buguoguo encouraged her SHG members to plant it on their own plots under the guidance of Heifer's project partner to set an example for other villagers. Eventually, under the leadership of Ji, villagers planted lucernes in Gudu community and helped make the environment green.
Ji said happily, "Before joining Heifer's project, we could only raise two or three pigs each. Thanks to Heifer, we were provided with capital to buy more pigs and now we can raise double the number of pigs, thus greatly increase our income.
Having become self-reliant, Ji Buguoguo is now looking forward to passing on the offspring of her pigs to other needy women, so that they can also have the opportunity to provide their families with a better future. Ji is just one of the examples on how women are achieving their dreams and building their communities.