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Project Profile

Mbeya NT Cluster | Malila

This language group is participating in the Mbeya NT Cluster project.

About 65,000 Malila people live in the mountains south of Mbeya, Tanzania. The climate of their homeland allows them to cultivate crops year round, and they grow enough beans, corn, peas, millet, sweet potatoes and vegetables to feed their families and sell for income at market. Some areas are good for growing coffee, and many people grow fields of chrysanthemums, whose attractive white flowers are dried and crushed to make the insecticide pyrethrum. Some farmers, however, have stopped growing the plants because the market is currently poor. Besides farming, some of the Malila raise livestock, cut timber, or own businesses like shops, pubs or mills.

Eager to begin a Bible translation program, a Malila translation and literacy team has been attending the workshops offered by SIL in Mbeya, Tanzania. The team started work in 2003 and has laid a foundation for the translation with careful linguistic work. They developed a new way of writing their language, and they have been studying the ways their language functions and compiling a dictionary. Some team members are teaching Malila people to read so that they will benefit from the new translation. The team began by drafting Jonah, Ruth and Mark, and their progress will continue from there.

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