Resourceful is a word often used to describe Heifer project participants. But nowhere have I found it more apt a description than for the project participants I've met in Vietnam.
Resourceful looks like Ma Xuan, 33, who, along with her husband worked as a seasonal laborer, and brought in only $20 a month to feed her family of five. But after training from Heifer, the gift of two cows and small microcredit loan, Ma Xuan has increased the family's income to more than $260 a month. It also looks like Hoang Anh Tuan, 50. A savvy businessman before he lost everything in the mid 1980s, Tuan took his microcredit loan of about $100 and invested in growing beans. He made $950 off his initial investment, and is now one of the most successful farmers in his group. He is also sending his son to college, and just bought a new bicycle for his eldest daughter to ride when she starts a school for students gifted in mathematics, physics and chemistry next week.