Vietnam Goats: Project Overview

In partnership with a local Vietnamese pastor, Agape Fish Fund is purchasing goats for breeding, income generation, and ministry among tribal groups in Vietnam.

Holistic Life Change, from Taiwan to Vietnam

​Vietnamese Inmates Converted in Taiwan
As part of his official assignment from The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) in Canada, Pastor Thu has been ministering to 100 Vietnamese inmates in Taiwan since 2007. A majority of these Vietnamese have become believers while they’re in the detention centers or prison. After they are released, they must return home, according to Taiwan’s government immigration policy.

Returnees Face Challenges in Vietnam
Pastor Thu visits the converted returnees back in Vietnam and helps connect them with churches in their homeland. During these visits, Pastor Thu has realized how the returnees are economically disadvantaged. The local areas where they live don’t have available jobs. Therefore many of them have to leave again to look for jobs elsewhere. Some of them go to bigger cities; others go to other countries such as Laos, Thailand, or Malaysia.

​A Plan for Livelihood in Vietnam

Livestock Breeding Center
We want to help alleviate the poverty in Vietnam so these returnees can have a livelihood in their homeland. We are partnering with Pastor Mui in Vietnam, who has a large piece of property. Together we will develop a livestock breeding center. This holistic project can satisfy the needs of the local church and its surrounding impoverished community in two ways, both economically and spiritually.

• Economic benefits: The community will have the opportunity for additional income by raising, breeding, and selling goats. This will help improve the standard of living for both the church and the community members.
• Spiritual benefits: The church can increase their influence in their community for evangelism. This strategy is an innovative way to evangelize, which is appropriate for the political and economic situation in Vietnam.

Proven Effective for Poverty Alleviation
According to the Goat and Rabbit Research Centre in Vietnam, goat production is popular in mountainous areas and is a means to improve the income of the rural poor. In fact, the results of goat farming seem so effective, that the research center proposes that research activities should be extended into more areas in Vietnam as a means of increasing farmers’ incomes and alleviating hunger and poverty in these areas of Vietnam. They conclude that goat production is playing an increasingly important role in the improvement of the income of poor farmers and is contributing significantly to poverty and hunger alleviation in Vietnam. [Source]

​Tribal Groups to Benefit

​This project will focus on helping the tribal groups in North Vietnam. They have the fastest growth in church planting, and we can help them strengthen their church ministry. These groups are recognized by the government as a minority under the leadership of the Tin Lanh National Church – North, so we will need to have a tight relationship with the Tin Lanh authorities.

Project Plan

This is a long-term project, and its ultimate goal is to establish small groups prior to church planting. This project can be divided into four stages: 

1.  Preparation
   This first stage will involve selecting the locals with most potential and assisting the leaders with initial developments such as setting up the facility and livestock.
2. Livestock Production and Discipleship Training
   After a certain period, about a year, the livestock should be reproducing, since goats and cows give birth yearly. During this second stage, the leaders will recruit people for livestock caregiver training. By this point, we expect the training center to have some income from the livestock production and to use these funds to cover the operation costs, such as providing food for the trainees and livestock. The trainers will also be in charge of the discipleship program for the livestock caregivers.
3. Passing It On to Others
   After the trainees have gained a proper understanding of how to care for the livestock and have finished the discipleship program, they will be given some livestock for breeding. The condition is that the graduated trainees must find another trainee in their area and repeat the same procedure as their initial training after the livestock has reproduced.
4. Follow Up
   ​The leader at the training center will follow up with the graduated trainees in their local areas. The leader will also help the trainees form small groups for Bible study and church planting afterward.

financial needs

Although we would hope for the local churches to provide the finances to start this ministry, the church is small and its members are poor with low income. Once the initial funds for this ministry are raised, this project plan can start to become a reality. 

These tribal people in North Vietnam are thirsty for spiritual truth and are desperate to overcome their economic challenges. This livestock breeding project addresses both of their needs and can also receive approval from the local authorities, which is usually a hindrance to evangelism. Will you join us to bless the rural communities in North Vietnam?

Donate $50 for a Goat

“The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labor.” (1 Corinthians 3:8)