Development Digest 4: Fair Trade USA

A couple of you may have already heard about this.

Fair Trade USA has announced they are leaving Fair Trade International. They will have their own certification process and symbol. Most importantly they want to have different standards that make it easier for large corperations to adopt fair trade. Key components of their new standards are:

allowing plantations,

certifying clothing, and

lower percentage of ingredients required to be certified to bear the logo.

On the plus side this means more companies carrying fair trade, but on the down side, most of their new certification standards sound like they are focusing more on the business aspect and less on the “fair” aspect of fair trade.

Something to consider is that growth in demand for fair trade has waned in recent years. I think perhaps because many people view fair trade products as a luxury item that can easily be replaced with something cheaper, and the economy is not particularly good.*

Fair trade UAS is a big organization and the logo and certification will be available on shelves in any country were companies are certified (not just the US) so this will have a significant impact on the evolution of fair trade.

Links

Here is an article with some quotes from important people http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/a-furor-over-fair-trade-11032011.html

Here is a good my.ewb thread on the topic, includes the reaction of USTF (a student organization that promotes FT on campus like we did) http://my.ewb.ca/posts/89293/

Here is a FAQ on the new logo http://fairtradeusa.org/sites/all/files/wysiwyg/filemanager/Fair-Trade-USA-FAQ-newcertificationmark.pdf

The official Fair Trade International FAQ http://www.fairtrade.net/897.html

*An article about demand for expensive fair trade products in recent years http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/recession-affects-sales-of-fairtrade-products-1906827.html

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URegina Development Digest Issue 3b: “Blood Minerals”

Hi again.  Here is the post from this weekend. I see a big connection with fair trade here and the complexity in creating monitored supply chains.

As a side note, if you were part of the voluntourism discussion (or not) you would likely be interested in this cool website about the orphanage industry that Anna Hopkins sent us.

“Blood Minerals”

Background

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is a country that has had military conflict since the late 90′s when wars spilled over from neighboring nations Uganda and Rwanda.  The country also has a very large low-tech mining industry. Approximately 10 million citizens are economically dependent on the mineral industry.

If one remembers a few years back, the movie Blood Diamond was about how military groups steal diamonds from mines and sell them to fund the wars.  Awareness of this issue resulted in the Kimberly Process for diamond certification.

The same thing happens with minerals such as tin, tungsten, gold and tantalum.  They are either stolen or illegally taxed. These minerals are used in the manufacture of many consumer goods, especially electronics, so the question was raised “Are your cellphones funding a war?”

In the eastern DRC where most of the military groups and mining takes place, it is estimated about half the mines are controlled by such groups. In 2008 it was estimated they extorted $140-225 million.

Where it gets interesting

Many human rights groups started to raise awareness that consumer electronics could contain materials that directly fund war.  The campaign has been so effective in North America that a new regulation is proposed in the states that will require companies to indicate whether materials are conflict-free.

Because of this pressure and the impending regulation, almost all companies have pulled out of the DRC and started looking elsewhere (except chinese companies according to Globe). This means a huge drop in demand and lower incomes for many miners.  Many exporters and businesses like smelters have left the country.

There is currently no method for certifying minerals as conflict free.  Canadian orginization PAC (http://www.partnershipafricacanada.org/about/index.html) is working to develop a system but complexities are everywhere.

Further, its likely that minerals stolen will make it to markets outside the Congo and into your products.  They could be sold to scrap dealers for example.

Some criticise the regulation and human rights work because it has had a negative impact on many Congolese who mine in areas not effected by war.

The certification group says it needs trade to test its methods but with the current situation, there are no companies trading, so they have no way to test it.

Resources

Report by a business group containing many useful statistics.

Globe and Mail article. 

Wiki about the wars in the DRC. 

Some brief stats about the war.

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URegina Development Digest Issue 3a: Occupy Wallstreet

So there was some mess-ups with my.ewb the last two weeks, and I lost both articles.  I rewrote both of them so today is a double-digest (just like archie comics)!  Here is the one from two weekends ago.

Occupy Wallstreet

Occupy Wallstreet (OWS) is a protest movement that started mid-September and continues in downtown New York, as well as many international cities.

The movement started because many people in the US are dissatisfied with bank bail-outs, low wages, low taxes for the extremely rich 1%, and the power that lobbyists have in American politics.

The movement was first suggested in the Canadian magazine Adbusters, however it has no formal leadership. This is good in that decisions are made completely democratically and locally on site, but bad because a lack of organization and clear goals at the outset was a major source of criticism.

It is characterized by being a movement that encompasses people from almost every demographic. It has also introduced a lot of people who are new to protesting.

The Occupy movement has had many noteworthy moments, including:

  • Police officers luring protestors onto a bridge, then arresting them for blocking the road.
  • Protestors filling a bank to cancel accounts, and protesting, resulting in their arrest.
  • Violent protests in Rome.  Financial situations in Europe, especially Italy and Greece are very bad for low income families.
  • The NYPD refusing an order from Mayor Bloomber to arrest the protesters en masse, citing that the protests currently cause no threat and performing the arrests would be impossible given the number of people.

Apart from a couple incidences however, the protests in North America and internationally have been non-violent.

Last weekend the Occupy Regina Movement started.  The tents were still there last I checked. You can check out their facebook page.

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URegina Development Digest Issue 2: Important Values for Successful Development

Acumen Fund is an organization that works to eliminate poverty and shares a lot of values with EWB.

10 Things We’ve Learned to be True is a great article about the approaches to development that Acumen Fund has found leads to success.  I really recommend you take a couple minutes to read it, the pictures are great too.

The link is short since you can skim through each page but I have copy and pasted the full article below for those of you that like reading.

For a great contrast, watch the World Bank’s 2009 Development report. You can see how differently they view and even define ‘development’. Can you spot some ways that their thinking and approaches differ from EWB and the article I linked?

Cheers,

 

Jeremy Lane

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URegina Development Digest Issue 1: Famine in Somalia

Foreword

Hey everyone.  Like we discussed in our first meeting, this year I plan to start a series of weekly emails, with the goal of learning about development related issues external to EWB.

The emails will typically be short summaries of a topic, with links to further resources at the bottom.

I encourage everyone to take 10 minutes and actually READ these emails.

If you have a suggestion for future topics or want to write one yourself, let me know.

Finally, discussion on this thread is encouraged!

A Brief Explanation of the Famine in Somalia

Here is a map detailing the situation in Somalia using the IPC scale.  The dark area is places where >20% of households completely lack food and death rates exceed 2/10k people per day (this was based on projections made back in July).

Death rates are esitmated to be over 7.4/10k now.

 

  • The region has not had proper rainy seasons in the past two years. This means terrible crops, increased food prices, and dying cattle.  The UN declared it a famine in July.
  • An Islamic militant group called Al-Shabaab, which started attempting to overthrow the Somalian government in 2009, currently controls the dark red region in the above map.  Because of this, the UN food aide pulled out in 2010. The militants control airfields in the region, preventing delivery of aid.
  • Al-Shabaab wont allow foreign aid from the UN and other groups because they accuse them of being politically motivated, spies, or using food as an excuse to teach Christianity.
  • Almost 1 million refugees have fled to camps in Kenya and Ethiopia. Camps are severly overcrowded and the two countries are already suffering famine themselves. Many refugees die of hunger on their way to Kenya. The trip is 10-20 days on foot.
  • The Kenyan famine is so bad already that schools have shut down because the children are starving.
  • US has pledged $5Mil to direct aid, compared to IKEA (yes, the furniture company) and Saudi Arabia which have both contributed ~$60Mil and the African Union which has devoted $300Mil.

Because many refugees are women and children, rates of abuse and rape are high in the outlying area of camps like Dadaab which currently has >400k people (hard to police).  This leads to AIDS infections etc.

Obviously, Al-Shabaab is the main reason that this situation is so complicated. Countries are hesitant to send aid that will likely be used/stolen by the militants.

Further Reading

Wikipedia article

Back To Dabaab (Al-jazeera article)

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Your Chance to Get Inside My Head!

August 9, 2010

The ingredients: It’s almost 5:30 PM and the sun is setting. I first walk down a large hill from town along a main road until I cross two rivers, after which, on smaller side roads and paths, I walk uphill a couple more kilometres to my home.

Extra flavour: Read out loud for exceptional first person effect. It’s like you’re really here!

This is what I was thinking as I walked home from work this afternoon.

I reflect on today. It was so refreshing. Refreshing in the way your family room carpet looks after a vacation. Refreshing in that it was a normal day in town and at work and not a crazy wild hectic day from last week.

I am thinking to myself how wonderful this afternoon was. This whole day, really. I take in the road construction in front of me as I think about how what… how great today was? Great? Fantastic? There is no word. Via texts, I find a friend and I had the same amazing day and we agree there`s just no describing it! (Huge smiles gets pretty close.)

I continue past the road construction and pause to watch for a bit. People around me are doing the same. Just watching. It’s just as interesting here as it is in Canada to see your neighbourhood road transform into a highway.

Road Construction

Road Construction

I turn off that road, towards my village. I lose my train of thought as a passer-by greets me, warmly. It was probably a super incredibly important thought (hah) but it doesn’t matter. I smile and greet some more people. I think I should count some day, how many people I greet in a day. (This blog post omits most of them.)

I notice, and not for the first time, women—girls, in fact—can carry the equivalent of seven trees of firewood on their heads. And chat exuberantly with one another while performing the feat.

I make note, a play-by-play of my walk home might be interesting blog material.

Near the primary school, I run into one of the teachers and his friendly grey stubble. He teaches me a couple new words in Chitumbuka as we chat. It comes so effortlessly to him, I wonder if there has been a time when he hasn’t taught me something.

Children love to greet me. And I don’t mean all of them; I mean each of them. Each and every child must elicit their own reply from me; a group wave on my part simply will not do. I see ahead of me a group of the neighbourhood children assembling on the road as I approach—handstands, somersaults, jumps, spins, cries, and smiles—waiting eagerly to greet me. An organised flurry of “How are you?”, “Bye”, “Good morning”, “Thank you”, “Mwatandala” (good afternoon), “Chawanangwa!” (my name), and I don’t know what else. Each get their own reply. A mother looks on and gives me an understanding smile. Every day, twice a day I expect these little terrorisers to meet me on the path, which is wonderful except when I’m tired and grouchy. Then, it’s wonderful.

I notice some people along the path I don’t recognise. They’re staring at me probably because I’m white. I’m used to it. And thinking about it, I realize I do the same thing! It’s just as uncommon for me to see a white person here. I always stare! I wonder where they are from, where they are staying, why they are here, what they are doing, and by blankly staring at them I feel closer to successfully getting these answers, though I’m not.

A white person, carrying maze last weekend. In some countries it’s illegal to look this good. Fortunately, Malawi is not one of them.

Then I see something I’ve never seen in three months of living in Malawi. Something so strange, almost absurd, I do a double take and then look around to see if anyone else sees it too. A man bikes by me wearing a bicycle helmet.

A woman carrying home a huge bucket of water on her head (not easy, believe me) greets me the way a woman carrying home a huge bucket of water on her head does, and that’s in exactly the same way as if she isn’t. She makes it look too easy, I think to myself.

Well, I’m home. I think that’s a pretty incredible commute, and I’m sure I missed a lot. The marvellous thing is, it’s not limited to my commute. This is how life is all the time. How can I describe it? I don’t know. Huge smiles, maybe.

Rock on,
Keith

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Everyday Life

I realize now, with only three weeks left in my village that, once back in Canada, it will be tough to relate how friendly, open, loving, and genuine people are here, let alone the wonderful experiences I’ve shared with them. Even now, I don’t know what to type. I will miss them dearly.

I thought that I’d retell some small interactions I’ve had with the hope that they might do a better job. These ones are all from the last couple days, but these sorts of things happen every day, all day long.

Maybe you will have a laugh, maybe you will be surprised. Some of these might make you think of your own loved ones, or perhaps  you could see it happening in Canada. Here goes…

Hitchhiking
A couple days ago, we were returning in the work truck from an afternoon of field work. We stopped for a young woman hitchhiking on the side of the road. She hopped in the back and I’m not sure where we were taking her, only that the sun was setting quickly. It was a long drive before we stopped to let her out. She crossed the road to meet her three children running across a grass field calling, “Mama!”. They hopped into her arms and how they didn’t topple her is still a mystery to me. We sat there a moment in the truck, just watching. The driver said, “We’ve done a good thing.” At such a heart-warming time, I was robbed of the right words and was left saying much less than I meant. “Yes.”

Skill
I’ve become pretty good at washing clothes by hand. My brother, however, spied me washing yesterday. He came over and told me with no excess sensitivity, that I did not do an adequate job of my jeans. He took them off the line and rewashed them. My grandma walked by and I pointed to the other pair of pants I’d washed. “Uwemi!” I exclaimed, pointing to the hanging trousers. These ones are good! She paused, assessing them in an instant, shook her head, and continued walking, chuckling to herself.

Uh-oh
This morning when I woke up, my brothers and some friends were mouse hunting. Exciting! I joined in. They’re quite the experts when it comes to hunting mice, but when one escapes and is running around like a balloon losing its air, it’s anyone’s game. Their numerous dives failed until I put my food down. Literally. I trapped the guy by his tail. One of my friends came by and asked me what I thought was, “How many mice have you caught?” Enthusiastically, I said, “seven!” To which he replied, in English, “so tasty.” Turns out he asked how many I would eat! Hope he doesn’t hold me to it.

Sorry!
I stubbed my toe on uneven ground. From my brother spewed the most sincere string of “sorry” and “pepani” that you would have thought he’d accidentally doused me with boiling water. Stubbing your toe in Malawi is apparently serious business. After a few months here, though, I’m used to that reaction.

Protection
On that same walk through the village to buy eggs, we ran into a boy I’d never met before. He looked about the same age as Dumi, so he was probably also in Dumi’s eighth grade class. I could sort of follow their conversation, but not really. I did catch one part: The boy wanted my brother Dumi to ask me for 100 Kwacha (money). Dumi said no, taking the conversation elsewhere and it seemed as though he moved slightly in between the boy and me.

Understanding
I was sitting around the fire cooking lunch when my oldest brother came looking for a stool. My grandma handed me onions and tomatoes to continue dicing as she got up and handed him her stool. She returned in a minute with a stool half the height of the first one. She didn’t expect it to be so low and with eyes wide in surprise, laughed when she sat and fell onto it. I didn’t catch any of the rapid fire Tumbuka she spoke and didn’t need to. We shared a good laugh.

Stranger danger?
While walking on the road to town, a car pulled up beside me. The driver I can only describe as jolly. He asked where I was going and I replied that I was just going to the filling station. (I was about 200 meters from it.) He reached over and swung open the passenger door for me. We barely introduced ourselves before we arrived and it left me with a smile on my face.

Morning commute
Monday morning. I wanted to check my email before work, so I stopped at the internet cafe, knowing I’d be a bit late to the office. Leaving the internet cafe at 8:00, I ran into Dambula (my counterpart at work) in the work truck. I hopped in to find out he was on his way not to the office, but to a carpenter’s. Okay. It turns out he lost the office key. The carpenter would change the door lock and knob for us. After picking him up it was to the market for a doorknob. Perfect, at a tailor I dropped off my swiss-cheese jeans I was carrying for repair at lunch time. In the market I ran into a man I’d met at the bus depot. He’d just started a new job at a (different) carpentry shop. I wanted to have a bawo board (a board game) made, so his shop was more than willing. Great! Back to the truck where I met the first carpenter and Dambula back and we made our way to the office. On the way, we passed our coworker, Samson, so we gave him a lift. While the carpenter was in the middle of the lock change, Samson found the key in the truck. We let the carpenter finish the change, however, because now we’d have two keys. Looking at my watch it wasn’t even 8:30 yet.

That hectic and confusing morning doesn’t seem that way to me. It’s natural. That’s how we roll here. And it wasn’t a whole morning, either. It was only 20 minutes.

Evening commute
Walking home from work one day, I noticed for the first time something that happens all the time. On my short walk, I ran into seven different friends on the road. Seven good friends. People you’d trust with your house keys. Plus numerous other acquaintances, relatives, and neighbours. Stopping to chat with them, or walking part way with others, I was struck that this doesn’t happen in Canada. For one, people don’t walk everywhere so these chance meetings are rare. And second, on average Canadians aren’t this friendly, no matter how we rank our own friendliness.

That’s all for now. No photos this time, friends; the gems are in the text :)

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10 Things About Malawi

I thought I’d share with you a list of 10 things about Malawi, which at first I found surprising, but I now don’t even consider. They’re normal. Last year our chapter’s JF, Vicki, did the same about Zambia, so please enjoy this one about Malawi too!
The keenly observant among you will notice that it’s my tenth post, and I’m making a list of ten things. Neat! But a coincident.
1. Garbage collection doesn’t exist. Litter is everywhere, because that’s the only place for it to go. On the bus, I throw biscuit wrappers out the window, in the market I toss banana peels on the ground, and at home garbage is left to blow around in the wind. It feels awful! It collects in gutters in town, or people sometimes sweep it into a pile and burn it. Definitely no recycling. One positive thing is Malawians are resourceful and reuse everything! Also, there is significantly less packaging and waste than in Canada.
2. Everyone has a cell phone, or two. There are two cellular networks here. Each has reduced rates to make calls to customers of the same network, so some people have one phone for each network. Air time (like minutes) can be purchased everywhere from shops to street vendors. Air time is costly, so phone calls are brief. It is nearly guaranteed that the caller will hang up on you abruptly, once they’re satisfied. Often this is mid-sentence.

The best cell phone! Yeah, it even has a flashlight.

3. It gets cold in Malawi! It’s winter here right now. Where I stay in Mzimba, nights can get as cold as 5°C in late June and July. May and June temperatures felt a bit cooler than May and June at home in Regina. It’s starting to warm up now and should be much hotter than summer in Canada by the end of August.
4. Travel on buses and minibuses. Neither of these will depart until they are full. This means every seat is occupied and the aisle is full. Buses are similar to city busses in Canada and travel between cities. Minibuses (stress on the “mini”) are like very compressed 15-passenger vans into which over 20 people and baggage can cram. Bus ticket prices are firm, but minibus conductors can be bargained down. I happen to be an expert at this and have a knack for sometimes getting even better prices than Malawians. Not easy!

White minibuses among traffic in Malawi’s capital, Lilongwe

5. Again, you observant ones hay have noticed from the photo that vehicles drive on the left-hand side. Vehicles always have the right of way, whether it’s the law or not. Travel on foot near vehicles is possibly as dangerous as travel by vehicle.
6. Door keys are skeleton keys. There’s one kind of door lever and lock that is, so far, the only style I’ve seen. It’s neat to use skeleton keys to open things. They really give a satisfying “click”.

Keys like these make you feel important.

7. Waking and sleeping hours are quite different from Canada. In my village (we have no electricity), people wake up a bit before sunrise, usually around 4:00 to 6:00 AM, every day—even weekends. Bedtime is around 8:00 PM or 9:00 PM.
around 8:00 PM or 9:00 PM.
8. The staple food is Nsima. It’s eaten every day, twice a day. It’s simply maize flour boiled in water until it reaches mashed potato-like consistency. It’s mostly tasteless but really fills you up! It’s eaten by hand, moulded into small lumps and taken with “relishes”. Some common relishes include beans, vegetables, eggs, or meat.
9. The currency here is Malawian Kwacha. 1 CAD is approximately 133 MK. For K100, you can buy 2 minutes of air time, jean repair at the tailor, 30 bananas, 2 apples, 2 Cokes, a haircut, a tin of shoe polish, 20 minutes at the internet cafe, or a loaf of bread. (One of those, not all of them!) Bills range from K20 to K500. Coins are K1, K5, and K10. But one Kwacha can’t buy anything, so places round totals to the nearest five relegating K1 coins to be more common in gutters than in peoples’ pockets.

Kwacha, Kwacha bills, y’all

10. Coke comes in 300mL glass bottles that are collected and refilled. Coke, Sprite, and three flavours of Fanta (Pineapple, Exotic, and the best: Passion) are the most common soft drinks. Another company, Sobo, also has a couple. People sometimes carry an empty bottle while travelling, so they can leave it at the shop when they buy a Coke, without having to pay the deposit.
Some of these things were a huge shock, like traffic on the left-hand side. Now, I think I’m so used to it, I will have to adjust to traffic when I return to Canada. It’s crazy how quickly humans can adjust and things become normal. Weird!
Best luck on the home turf!
Keith
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Chicken Wrangler Extraordinaire Adventure #2

I had such a great response to my story about catching a chicken, I thought just for fun I could share…

Chicken Wrangler Extraordinaire Adventure #2

One morning, I bought a chicken from our neighbour because we were expecting a guest. It is customary here to serve guests chicken. We brought it to the cookhouse/kitchen in our yard and tied its legs. Legs tied?! You must be thinking where does the Wrangler come in? Well, Marie untied the chicken to kill it. It must be a respect thing. Anyway, the bird got itself out of the kitchen in a hurry! Chickens
may not be too smart, but they know when they’re about to become lunch, that’s for sure.

In a flash, my brother Dumi and sister Marie were after it through the neighbour’s banana tree patch. I dropped everything and ran to help!

Of course, it was a cunning one and eluded our deadly trio of tactical chicken catching prowess. The chicken flew, as chickens do, across our yard with me pursuing in a full on sprint to another neighbour’s unkempt grass patch and hunkered down in the thickest part. No problem! Chicken Wrangler #1 is here!

I dove into scratchy dry grass as tall as I stand, only to have the bird slip through my fingers. I caught only a feather!

But it didn’t go far; it was tuckered out after the flight. The tricky trio closed in again and I nabbed it! Successful chicken catch number two.

Emerging from the bush, Dumi looked at me and said, “Ah! Blackjack!” That’s bad news. I looked down my body and my whole right side was covered-armpit to ankle-with the prickly seed burrs called Blackjack. They are the size, shape, and colour of wild rice grains but with three fine hooks on one end that catch on anything-supercharged Velcro. I looked like a hedgehog they were so thick.

I handed over the chicken to Grandma, as proud as I was the first time and then, to Marie’s amusement and my discomfort, proceeded to spend no less than 10 minutes picking off the prickly Blackjacks with Dumi’s help.

Meanwhile, Grandma had been busy. By the time we finished, the feathered fugitive was no longer feathered and well on its way to becoming Sunday’s lunch.

The end.

Grandma making lunch.

In other news, that was a lovely weekend spent at home with my family. We had lots of fun working, doing laundry, cooking, playing Frisbee, chatting and laughing at me. I spent part of an afternoon to create this masterpiece from a nearby bamboo patch. A bamboo pan flute. I’ve got a one-octave major scale! I was thrilled.

Me playing the pan flute.

This week I’m off to Zambia for a whirlwind tour of the country. A well-deserved vacation, I think.

Till next time, may all your chickens be plastic-wrapped.

Keith

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SHWAP

SWHAP! This is the development-sector-friendly acronym for my work this summer. (Thanks Payton!)

Safe Water HAndling Practices. This is my main project while I’m here at the District Water Office in Mzimba, Malawi. I will now do my best to try explain it, taking the long way there, and beginning with the background.

In the past, aid has often been about numbers. In fact, a lot of it still is. It’s easy to say things like ”Last month we donated 200 cases of chlorine tablets.” Or “This program will see 11 houses constructed.”

Too often, I think, “helping” has been equated with giving things. And doesn’t that feel great? You’ve given someone in need something for free! But did they really need it? Is this addressing the problem or is it treating the symptoms of that problem?

How much of this ‘giving’ is actually forcing? Picture an organization driving out to a remote village in Malawi and donating chlorine for water treatment. If the community gets a quick explanation of what it is, how to use it, and why it’s good, is that enough to encourage a change? In my experience here, no. It certainly isn’t. In the three villages in which we have so far tried the SWHAP program, two had previously received chlorine handouts from the government and both had thrown the chlorine away. This is just one of many, many examples I’ve seen here.

Handouts don’t work.

This is why the district government is so excited about this new program I’m helping develop with them.

The idea behind the project is that communities can lead their own change. They are capable of change without handouts. Moreover, the changes made by communities are sustainable, if they come from within the community—they will have ownership over it—instead of being forced on them from the outside.

This is so important. Maybe you want to read that again!

There are programs being implemented in this spirit around the country. This simple understanding, that poor people are people, seems so simple—People power! But there are still too many projects, which aren’t using these principles. (If you are curious, I have some of my own thoughts on why they still exist, but I have to keep this post moving!)

After first arriving in Malawi, I was involved in the CLTS program in this district. It’s exactly this. A facilitation process in communities whereby communities are triggered to change their own behaviours. No subsidies, no handouts. The results are incredible! Yesterday I followed up in one of the villages and it’s astonishing, the work the community has done itself. Imagine families digging 12+ foot deep holes by hand and constructing shelters with locally available materials. When people are truly motivated themselves, they have the power. The results are incredible.

Finally to SWHAP. Hopefully, I haven’t been too confusing.

SWHAP (Safe Water HAndling Practices) considers all of this.

Field staff from the government’s health department and water department come into a village to learn. They ask questions of the community, and use “tools” to ignite a behavior change within people.

The community will take the facilitators to their drinking water source, which might be a stream, well, or borehole. The facilitators will then use these “tools”, which are simply demonstrations that encourage discussion and controversy among the community. Practically, a tool can be as simple as taking a cup of water from the drinking pail, drinking some of it, and returning the rest of the water to the pail. Enough to encourage debate among the community and start conversations about safe practices around drinking water.

SWHAP targets transportation of water to the home, treatment of the water, storage, and consumption behaviours.

The facilitation process hinges on good facilitators. It’s a people-centred process, and very personal. There is no set procedure, rather the tools are adapted to any situation.

The result is, community members collectively create an action plan to—get this—plan what actions they will take.

The government field workers then monitor the villages and help in whatever ways they can until the community has completed their own
behaviour change.

The first ever SWHAP facilitation. Facilitators interact with a community at a stream, their drinking water source.

It doesn’t take handouts and it doesn’t take millions of dollars. All it takes is good planning, adaptive facilitation, and timely follow ups.

People power.

It’s Friday today and this week we’ve just finished testing the process and the tools in three villages. We’ll continue to unpack all the learnings we can from those trials to improve the process, before trying a second iteration.

Today, very motivated and expressive individuals we identified from each village as natural leaders were brought together to share their villages’ action plans. It was incredible the detail and extent to which the communities had planned. All three villages have committed to being “safe” within 5 days! The facilitators were thrilled with the progress and can’t wait to follow up with the villages on their planned dates.

That’s a (quick?) look at SWHAP! Please send any questions/arguments
you have my way and I’ll do my best to answer!

Peace,
Keith

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