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PLEASE NOTE!
No letters will be published unless full contact details (Phone Number / Address), have been submitted with same, not necessarily for publication.
Wells For Zoe just grows and grows
We are just home after our 49th working trip to Malawi.
Two years ago, in a little flash of madness I decided that we could convert a disused building into a rural health clinic. This flash from somewhere above has seen us open our 12th such facility this week. It is our first with the South Mzimba Health Board, who had 28 of these running until Government funding stopped a few months ago. Devaluation of the Malawian currency by over 50% has been a disaster. This monthly clinic will be linked to our tree nurseries and Land Restoration projects in this new area for us.
The official opening of the latest (in Mtaja) in another disused building we refurbished for the job, was a special occasion. The people came from everywhere with all the Chiefs and community groups attending for the big occasion. They used two Health Board tents (to shield the sun), got 100 chairs and set everything up for the big day - all a bit different from the Northern region. They had the head of District Nursing and Midwifery, 12 chiefs, 5 Community Nurses, 1 Doctor, and 5 Area health officers. We would love to have been there but our son Éamonn was lucky enough to attend and be part of the action.
Education of girls has always been a big interest of ours, particularly remembering the Ireland long ago (or even in my own time). As we have done for many years, we currently fund about 334 girls in secondary school in our Girl Child Student (GCS) project. We now fund over 30 girls in University which is a follow-on from that. We also run about 60 preschools for boys and girls where we have approximately a hectare of land where the parents come together to produce food to feed them.
We are now in the 2nd year of our Tailoring Course run by two former GCSs who take on and train 3 students every 6 months in a course designed by one of our board, Eilís Butler. Amongst the skills they learn is the manufacture of reusable sanitary pads for distribution to our students, staff and nursery workers - all made with the help of 4 trusty Singer sewing machines!
One of our other GCSs, Lusungu Chirwa, has come back to work for us recently, after getting 3 A's in her degree. This is particularly great news for St Patrick's Parish (Lucan) who funded her education over the years, and for which we are so thankful; more so maybe because very little of our current funding is local or Irish anymore.
The pumps go on and on - Manufacturing, Installing & Maintaining - and we currently have 2,854 installations on our website & WfZ map, with many more having been installed before we started recording them this way.
Land Restoration is our Major project these days. Over the years Malawi like everywhere cut down its trees without replacing any, leaving hillsides with major Soil Erosion problems and all the associated negatives of this. We plant only local species, follow their progress with 1000s of photos of sowing, planting and growing using our in-house developed greenhouse. Flority system, and further this transparency by using drones to add this data to our mapping system. We have record success rates with some species and our percentages keep rising.
Our funders (predominantly Mastercard's Priceless Planet Coalition as supported by WRI/CI) observe everything very closely and value how we treat communities, with healthcare, education, and food production. The added community restoration support and engagement - which is what WfZ has always been about - means people are less likely to cut down or burn the trees. Of course, the fact that the project employs up to 2000 workers in busy times, mainly women, who never had an income before, is a major bonus for these communities.
This is just a quick summary of what Wells for Zoe is currently doing. Keep an eye on our website for further stories and updates.
www.wellsforzoe.org
We are planning our 50th visit in March and no doubt there will be a little celebration.
John and Mary Coyne
Note: We received the above from John and Mary too late for our last issue, but they sent Christmas and New Year Greetings to all!
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