Mbeza Community Projects, Malawi
Our Aim and Strategy
Aim: It is our aim to help a community in Malawi to see an end to extreme poverty.
Our Strategy is:
- To enable farmers to become food self sufficient principally through the agricultural support scheme.
- To provide support to enable access to basic health care and medicines. This includes a mosquito net support project, a HIV/Aids testing and education scheme and the setting up of a medical centre.
- To support orphans who need help with school fees through the Moses scheme.
- To develop an Enterprise project that will enable the members of the community to earn a living and develop an income for the community through fair-trade principles.
- To support the pastors and members of Mbeza Community Church through teaching and training.
Agricultural project at Mbeza village
One of the great joys of our visit to Mbulukuta village in July/August 2009 was to see the progress made in the agricultural project.
The project had a slightly bumpy start and to resolve some of the communication issues we decided to ask Peatry Ntodwa to manage this project for us. Peatry was with us here in the UK during March 2009. We have had excellent communication from Peatry and with his help and advice the project is on track.
I was personally a little concerned that in the first year so much of the funds had been spent on fertilizer and not enough spent on training and education. My conclusion however after this visit was that it was unrealistic of us to expect these farmers to engage with our issues of agricultural improvement without first tackling their annual issue of growing enough food to feed their families.
The farmers had fantastic maize crops in 2009, many of them more than doubling their yields. The programme for 2009-2010 still has large funds set aside for fertilizer but with more this
time being spent on training, tools and better seed. The training will begin to address the issues of soil improvement through composting and manuring training and livestock rearing.
This project is sponsored by Driffield Parish Church from 2008 to 2010/11. They have given us £12,000 of funding for the three years of the project. This is equivalent to each farmer receiving £160/year. There are 25 farmers in the project.
Mbeza Community Farmers Club Interim Report - PDF Format (80kb)
Medical Centre at Mbulukuta village
During the visit in 2008 and beforehand a survey was carried out that provided a picture of the health of the community. The findings were alarming to say the least and are typical of many communities in Malawi. From 2007 – 2008 12% of adults died, most of these were in the 17-35 age range. In the same period 15% of the children died and most of these were in 1 month – 5 years age range.
In 2009 we were able to complete the mosquito net project. Thank you to Driffield Parish Church and Little Driffield, Manor School in York, Nafferton Primary School and one particular very generous donor. Everyone in the village now has a net!
During our visit in 2009 we were able to have further discussions about the medical centre. We finally have an accurate estimate of the costs to equip the centre and the costs to run it. We need £1500 to equip the centre and it will cost £95/day to run it. This funds a nurse, a clinician, a cleaner and a security guard. We hope in 2010 to be able to open the centre for two days a month with the initial health focus being on pre natal and post natal care. Peatry Ntodwa is currently working with the community to write a policy and plan for the centre.
HIV/Aids testing and education
In 2008 we had been disappointed by the fact that the community at Mbulukuta village has done nothing to address the issue of HIV/Aids. They were quite open about this. In the last year there has been a significant change of attitude and it was a great joy to see the readiness and willingness of the community to begin to tackle the issue.
In November 2009 Peatry Ntodwa and his team began a programme of voluntary testing and education at Mbulukuta village. An excellent start was made.
Bag making project
In 2007 Denise Davies from Driffield School led a group of 12 young women providing training in the making of bags designed at Driffield School. The project provides the women with a fair wage and in addition the profits made in the UK will go into a Community fund for Mbeza village to help improve basic health care.
The project had a difficult start in 2007 and 2008 and we are encouraged that in 2009 again with Peatry Ntodwa’s leadership we have resolved the major issues of communication, postage and meeting deadlines.
The project has expanded in the UK with several schools and other outlets becoming involved and we have achieved more than double the sales in 2009 compared to 2008. Our goals for 2010 is to achieve 1500 sales and also to expand the product range.
Plans for 2010 and 2011
In 2010 we are hoping to have Peatry Ntodwa and the Crusader Theatre Company back during September/October. The purpose of this visit will be to work with Driffield School and Driffield Parish Church and hopefully a partner school in York. The company will be performing a play as well as a choral work that is currently being written here. The choral work is in several movements and explores Malawian themes. The main goal of the visit is to promote and further develop the work of the charity MOSES which provides educational sponsorship for orphans in Malawi. This charity aims to provide sponsorship for orphans who need help paying their Secondary School fees. It began in 2004 with six sponsored students. At the beginning of 2010 there are over 70 students on the scheme. If you would like to consider sponsoring a student please visit:
Can you help?
There are several ways that you could support the work that we are doing in Malawi.
- Consider visiting Malawi with us in 2011
- Could you help promote the bag project by selling some of the bags? Could you display them for example at work? Or do you have contacts who would be interested in helping us promote this project?
- Consider sponsoring a student through the Moses charity. www.malawianorphans.co.uk
- Attend one of the performances in October 2010
- Invite us to speak about the work that we are doing
Thankyou
Julian Watson