About NPO Kulima Juu

• “Kulima Juu” is a specified Non-Profit Organization (NPO) whose purpose is to promote international cooperation and to activate human communities in rural and mountainous areas.
• Kulima Juu is in Swahili language spoken in Eastern Africa. It means do our best to cultivate or let's perform better agriculture.
• Kulima Juu is based in Madoyama community, in whish two families are living. The community is located on the foot of Shirakami Mountains in Akita Prefecture. The mountains are one of the first World Natural Heritage sites of UNESCO in Japan. It is the northernmost community in the basin of Taneume River that has its water source in Shirakami Mountains.
• We cannot survive without food. The most important activity of the NPO is not to depend our own food on commercial-based one as possible as we can and to enjoy an independent life.
• Together with people who have grown up in different cultures, we try to create a community to deepen mutual understanding with producing food and improving lifestyles.
• We will be involved in the activity of local community with people from the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa, and promote that each people can accept naturally the human diversity.
• In any society, we strive for the strong mind to survive independently and conscientiously and for peaceful world.

About the Democratic Republic of the Congo, people in which we act together

• The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) is one of the two countries in Africa that bear the name Congo. The other is the Republic of the Congo, a former French colony. Since the capital is Brazzaville, it is also called Brazzaville Congo. DR Congo was formerly known as the Republic of Zaire, but changed back to the Democratic Republic of the Congo that was given after gaining independence from the Kingdom of Belgium. The country is also called Kinshasa Congo because of its capital Kinshasa.
• DR Congo is, located on the equator in central Africa, a large country as seven times as the territory of Japan. It is one of the very poor countries due to a long period of oppression. The common language is French from the former colonial power of Belgium, and there are four regional languages. One of them is Swahili spoken in eastern Congo. Additionally, each tribe speaks own language. Most people speak at least those three languages.
• Kulima Juu is involved in the Swahili-speaking provinces, North Kivu and South Kivu, in eastern Congo. It is one of the most densely populated regions in the world due to its fertile soil and rich mineral resources. As a result, conflicts are not ceased, and it is said that millions of people have died since the civil war in neighboring Rwanda, making it difficult to build a stable society.
• Society is unstable, but the people are friendly and non-aggressive. Because it is located in the Great Rift Valley, where the African continent is rifted, the area is tectonically active and has beautiful volcanoes and lakes like Japan. The local forests are home to such rare animals as mountain gorillas, eastern lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, okapis, and potamogales, an enigmatic aquatic giant otter shrew. One of the smallest people in the world, known as Pygmy, is also habitant in the forest. They are called Bambuti or Mbuti locally. Their conversations sound like songs.