Written by: Erin Rouse
Mason Harmon, senior marketing and business administration major, is starting an agricultural business on the island of Ebeye, where he currently serves as a student missionary. Harmon began crafting this project to help meet the needs of the island, he told the Accent. He also teaches high school students.
“The thing that makes my mission special is not that I serve as a teacher but that I am one of the few missionaries who is serving to start a business,” Harmon said.
Harmon hopes to start growing agricultural products on Ebeye so its inhabitants can purchase locally sourced fresh fruits and vegetables. According to Harmon, Ebeye, located in the Marshall Islands, is only 80 acres but has a population of 18,000.
“If you just climb up on a roof [in Ebeye], you can clearly see the ocean on either side,” Harmon said
Due to its compact size, Ebeye does not produce many agricultural goods, he added.
“There are so many people that Ebeye has to depend on,” Harmon said. “They have to import from the United States and other countries. This has led to a huge disaster with the health of the people and has left them in a really bad position. I’ve come to change that.”
“The thing that makes my mission special is not that I serve as a teacher but that I am one of the few missionaries who is serving to start a business.”
Harmon added that if a scheduled supply ship is late to the densely populated island, residents will be left with minimal groceries. This extreme dependence on outside food sources has led the people to appreciate what they have, he said.
So far, Harmon has been teaching locals farming techniques and telling them about his vision to help Ebeye take advantage of its agricultural possibilities, he said. Harmon’s business plan will double as a sustainable project for the school where he teaches and helps bring nutrition education to life for its students.
Harmon said when he isn’t teaching or lesson planning, he is making progress on building the business by composting, germinating seeds and monitoring the early stages of agricultural growth.
“Mason is trying to fulfill two roles at Ebeye. First, he is looking at coming up with a business plan that will benefit the community, but also a business that will eventually become self-sustaining, if not profitable,” Steven Manoukian, student missions director, said. “His second objective is to support the school that we have there: teach, meet the students’ parents and be a blessing to the church as well as the community as a whole.”
Ebeye was not a part of Harmon’s original plan when he decided to become a student missionary. Through many answered prayers, however, he decided to serve on the island, he said.
Manoukian said Harmon was planning to go to Bolivia. However, just three months before he was supposed to leave for South America, Harmon got information about the mission location that led him elsewhere, Manoukian explained.
“I did a lot more praying, and, to me, it seemed that Bolivia was no longer an option for me and for what I wanted to do while serving,” Harmon said, “so I decided to change destinations.”
Following this decision, Harmon reached out to the missions department at Southern Adventist University, and it put him into contact with the Guam-Micronesia Mission of Seventh-day Adventists, he said. He began networking with the mission and pitching his agricultural business project idea. According to Harmon, Ebeye showed a lot of interest in the business and accepted him to come serve.
“I saw that the Lord had opened so many doors to bring me here that I just took a step out in faith.”
“When I realized I was going to Ebeye, there were actually no fears that were holding me back,” Harmon said. “Of course, I was anxious about a few unanswered questions. But I just prayed about it, and I saw that the Lord had opened so many doors to bring me here that I just took a step out in faith.”
Harmon was quick to add that he has faced challenges and frustrating moments during his time on Ebeye, but nothing he has experienced has caused him to regret accepting God’s call. He said he feels very blessed to be on the island.