Loos and luck
I really need the loo. I’ve been at my desk for well over three hours and so far have filled my body with two cups of tea, one cup of coffee and a fair amount of water too. But I have the misfortune of working on the very top floor of Practical Action’s head office, which means that a trip to the loo involves climbing all the way downstairs. And I’m so engrossed in my work (and also a little lazy – it is Friday, after all) that I really can’t be bothered….
I’m currently writing a proposal to fundraise for a hugely exciting new project that Practical Action is embarking on in Zimbabwe. We’re working with rural communities in the southern provinces of Gwanda and Mwenezi, endeavouring to reach out to 200,000 people to improve their access to clean water, ensure they have adequate sanitation and reduce their health risks from poor hygiene. The figure is massive. 200,000 people is over double the size of my home town!
Most of these people currently live several kilometres away from a safe water supply. The task of collecting water usually falls to women and children who will spend whole days carrying up to 80 litres of water. The journey can be dangerous – these women are vulnerable to mugging and rape; and the water they do collect often isn’t fit for human consumption anyway.
Furthermore, many families in Gwanda and Mwenezi don’t have toilets in their own homes as they can’t afford to build them. This means that people usually just relieve themselves outside in the bush. This morning I’ve read stories from women and girls who describe the complete loss of dignity and embarrassment they feel while doing this, especially when they’re menstruating.
Suddenly my reluctance to walk down a flight of stairs to go to the toilet demonstrates not only laziness, but complete ignorance of how fortunate I am. Wherever I am, it only ever takes me a few minutes to fetch a glass of clean water or go to the loo.
I am lucky. But it shouldn’t be about luck. Having clean water and being able to go the toilet without putting your safety or health at risk are basic human rights to which people everywhere are entitled, whether you live in Warwickshire or Gwanda.
Now I really must go – I’m desperate.
2 Comments » | Add your commentShelter me – and I’ll shelter you too
This week I have been researching shelter in Africa, namely Zimbabwe.
When I think of the word ‘shelter’, I think of feeling warm, safe and dry; of cups of tea, or my lovely, cosy bed, or hugs from my Mum; or that gorgeous Ray LaMontagne song Shelter, where shelter is more than just a sense of physical safety but one of emotional security too; of feeling that all is right in the world; and of my home, a sanctuary.
All too often in the world’s poorest places, your home is not a safe place where you can seek sanctuary from the evils that populate the world. In fact, your home might be the problem itself. Perhaps it’s simply physically insubstantial and doesn’t protect you from harsh weather like flooding, or natural disasters such as earthquakes. Or maybe there are so many people squeezed inside it that the danger lurks within.
For communities in urban Zimbabwe, overcrowding and inadequate housing are very real and dangerous realities.
It wasn’t always like this. Zimbabwe used to be one of Africa’s most successful countries, ‘the bread basket of Africa’, with a strong economy, a local government system that delivered the services it was meant to provide, and with the people skilled to support those services.
The country is now struggling economically. The gap between rich and poor is widening, skilled people are migrating in search of better employment prospects, and access to basic services, such as water and sanitation, waste collection and roads, is now for many people just an impossible dream.
Hyper-inflation, very high unemployment (estimated at over 90%), a rapidly devaluating currency and a high HIV/AIDS prevalence rate (15.3%) have all contributed to increasing levels of vulnerability for Zimbabwean people. 80% of the population lives on less than 85p a day.
And in 2005, life became so much worse for 700,000 poor women, men and children who were the victims of the Zimbabwean government’s Murambatsvina Operation. Murambatsvina (English: Operation Drive Out Trash), also officially known as Operation Restore Order or the Clean Up Operation. This was a large scale Zimbabwe government campaign to forcibly clear slum areas across the country. The campaign started in May 2005 and according to United Nations estimates, has affected at least 2.4 million people. In July 2005, UN-HABITAT estimated that 700,000 people lost either their homes or livelihoods, or both.
But the Government of Zimbabwe says the operation was launched after extensive consultations with stakeholders. The primary objective, the Government says, was to rid the urban environments of illegal structures and unlicensed trading premises. The aim of the national clean-up exercise was meant to decongest the cities and towns and establish an environment conducive to investment.
Unfortunately, the Government wasn’t able to replace the people’s homes, with inflation then raging at 1,700,000%.
Local authorities have struggled since the ‘clean up’, with the enormous task of ensuring that poor and vulnerable people living in urban areas have access to the basics that we take for granted – clean water at the turn of a tap, toilets, where people, particularly children, are protected from the waste and have privacy, refuse that is removed regularly, streets that are clean and safe to walk in, and, fundamentally, the security of knowing you have a home that is legally yours to rent or own.
Furthermore, since the ‘clean up’, overcrowding has become a massive problem in many urban areas. Almost overnight houses suddenly had to host three families rather than one, with nothing more than blankets to separate different families’ living areas. TB and cholera are rife. Children will often sleep on the floor underneath their parents’ bed. This fact is actually a contributing factor to the high HIV rate. Children are exposed to their parents having sex just above them, and children being children, will begin to copy this from a very young age. Young girls are falling pregnant as young as 12 years old, and rape cases are on the rise. And I’ve read stories of mothers who are forced to prostitute themselves just to make enough money to pay rent and feed their children.
Practical Action is training these marginalised communities, who have come through so much, to improve their houses, ensuring they are safe places offering real shelter. Brick by brick, people here are rebuilding their own homes, and their hopes for a brighter future.
Our approach is to help people to make the best use of their own labour and to use locally produced building materials and construction techniques that they can afford and manage themselves. Ensuring that people have good quality homes to live in, with enough space for everyone, doesn’t just improve living conditions – it can become a catalyst for the further development of communities by creating local jobs, and an infrastructure that benefits everyone.
I sit here at my desk listening to that song Shelter, hoping from the bottom of my heart that the people in Zimbabwe with whom we are working will once more have safe homes that are full of happiness and love, and free from harm and danger. Sanctuaries.
No Comments » | Add your commentCelebrating 100 years of International Women’s Day
Today is International Women’s Day, and more specifically – the 100th International Women’s Day. Having attended an all-girls high school where several inspirational teachers instilled into us the belief that the only barriers facing us were the limits of our own imaginations, I have long believed in the importance of a movement which pushes the agenda for women – for as musician Annie Lennox laments “from India to Illinois women face violence just for being female.”
Yet it is only since working for Practical Action that I have come to realise how vital it is to fight for the rights of women across the world. All too often poverty has a female face – women are far more likely than men to be poor because of the discrimination they face in education, health care and employment. This poverty is not just a shortage of money with which to buy things. It is “the lack of sufficient resources with which to keep body and soul together”[1] – i.e. not only material poverty but poverty of wellbeing.
Practical Action works closely with some of the world’s poorest people helping them to use simple technology to fight poverty and transform their lives for the better. We don’t start with technology, but with people. The tools may be simple or sophisticated but in order to provide long-term, appropriate and practical answers we know that must be firmly in the hands of local people – both women and men. So whether we’re working to establish Women’s Development Associations, strengthening the voices of poor urban women, or improving workplace conditions for women in the Zimbabwean construction industry, we are constantly striving to promote gender equality and empower women. We have done this for the past 45 years and we shall continue to do so – until the world is a place where women are protected from violence, where girls can grow up safe, healthy and educated, where women’s voices are listened to, valued and respected.
[1] Definition of ‘absolute poverty’ by The House of Commons Scottish Affairs Committee 1 Comment » | Add your comment
Resume of visit to Zimbabwe – Day 2
Monday 11th October 2010
We had an informative day, packed with action on this our first day with the Practical Action staff in Harare. First Ernest introduced us to all the staff and showed us round the offices – in a house bought some years ago. He briefed us and we learnt some interesting contextual information about Zimbabwe.
- For photos they need to get permission from the authorities
- There are four currencies but US$ is the main one – there are few US coins and most things cost at least a dollar, so life is expensive
- The slum clearance in 2005 meant a lot of disruption for the poor in Harare
He also told us a lot about Practical Action – its work being mainly with Aim 1 in Reducing Vulnerability of the very poor, Aim 3 which is Infrastructure, Water and Sanitation is often with the urban communities but most Practical Action work is being in the rural rather than urban communities in Zimbabwe.
There is around 40 staff in the office. We went with Terence in the morning and with Reginald in the afternoon.
Terence took us round several Bore Hole projects – altogether 148 bore holes were put in seven towns. We saw bore holes that had been installed near clinics and residential areas to provide clean water during the time of the Cholera outbreak when the water provided by the authorities had become polluted and clean water from the acquifers needed to be available. The bore holes had been put in by UNICEF but Practical Action have helped with the maintenance of them and they have made a huge difference to the local population. They are beset with problems such as:
- Lack of community cohesion to support the infrastructure
- Lack of funding from the City authorities to maintain good water supply and infrastructure
- Inconsistent electricity supply
- The need to import pipes as they are not locally available
We next visited a school in the outskirts where Practical Action had been involved in a Water Sanitation and Hygiene (wash) project. Again this work had been done in collaboration with UNICEF and some others (we have been surprised and delighted to see how many projects are collaborative).
The headmistress shows us round her ‘office’ and the school classrooms were enough to make you weep. There are 1,256 children aged under 15. They looked delightful in their beige and green uniforms and each child has to pay 45$ a year to be schooled there. But, around three quarters of the parents cannot pay so funding is a big problem.
This came home to me when looking at the Sanitation blocks that Practical Action had built for them (before they had sufficient toilets), there was no toilet paper available. We asked the headmistress about it and she said they could not afford to provide any and either the children had to bring it from home or use paper from their exercise books.
Practical Action is now helping provide materials for new classrooms. The current ones are three ancient and ramshackle corrugated iron sheds with broken windows and desks crammed in. The teachers have six simultaneous classes in one of the sheds, each with around 45-50 children. There are insufficient blackboards – the facilities are non-existent.
Practical Action hopes to help with the new building by providing bricks and cement and by helping the parents who will be doing the building with the necessary skills. This should happen within the next seven months.
The headmistress said ‘it’s very tough’. Luckily she has a strong School Association (SDA) who she feels will put their back into it when all the materials are to hand.
After luch we met another group that had all the signs of a vigorous local community wanting to help themselves. These were an association from Mbare, one of the poorer districts of Harare, which had funds from DFID and Practical Action to extend their very very small houses in order to house more members of their family. Jane was their spokesman, a 54 year old grandmother carrying on her back her daughter’s baby (her daughter is ill and cannot afford the visit to the gynaecologist – here in Zimbabwe there is little welfare provision and people must pay to see a doctor).
The project that Reginald showed us was for Shelter – shelter for orphans and for the very poor. These extra rooms were built on to houses in Mbare at a cost of around $2,000 each, about a quarter of the normal price. This was because Practical Action supplied the bricks and concrete and the local association provided some of the labour.
The need is great, in several houses we saw about 15 in the house – people have to sleep on the floor in the living room (yes, no beds) at night as there is not enough room for beds for everyone. There is no shower room, just a shack outside.
Many of the new rooms still are not plastered but the families do all sorts of things to try and make a bit of money to finish them off – making bread, selling eggs or drinks, anything to make an honest dollar.
In all, with the help of the local authority planning department, 44 houses were built up in this one area. Agnes and the other ladies who showed us with such grace, around their homes (by standards so incredibly impoverished) will stay in our hearts for a long time..
If only money could be provided to finish them off – but the question is do you provide more of the needy with bricks and a roof or do you finish the ones you have to the required standard? When people are crying out for homes, it is a difficult decision. It needs the wisdom of Solomon to resolve.
Thank you Practical Action for providing us with such a great first learning day. We all need long pockets – their need is so great and it makes us feel so lucky to have in the West what we take for granted – shelter, water, food.
No Comments » | Add your commentResume of visit to Zimbabwe – Day 1
Ruth McNeil and Helena Moylneux are on a visit to Zimbabwe, the first Trustee visit to Practical Action, Southern Africa. The visit is taking place in Zimbabwe which is the largest of the countries (the others being Mozambique and Zambia) and starts in Harare where the Southern Africa Regional Office is based. Apparently, the tenth day of the tenth month of the tenth year is an auspicious one.
Sunday 10th October 2010
We arrived along with my husband, Ian McNeil, at Harare having flown via Johannesburg. It was an eventful flight but as we were bringing into the country some medical equipment (blood pressure machines, stethoscopes) for the Harare hospital (Ian being a doctor), there was a small question at the airport of whether duty should be paid. After a few minutes conversation and reassurances that this equipment was for charitable purposes and not for sale, we were allowed through duty free.
Joshua from Practical Action office was there in a van to collect us.
The drive from the airport to the hotel on the outskirts of Harare on the aptly named Airport Road was gladdened by the beautiful purple blue Jacaranda trees. In the afternoon we visited the centre of the city, sadly just missing a Revival Meeting in the main park of Harare, where thousands of people, many in the ‘uniforms’ showing their church affiliation, were flocking. Next time we must time things better! The park itself showed signs of slight neglect (litter, little recent watering) but still had a lovely and safe feel to it and we felt rather out of place with all the courting couples holding trysts on this balmy Sunday afternoon.
A walk downtown revealed a city that is in transition, some stunning stone, glass and marble buildings recently erected alongside more tumbledown buildings. The pavements showed signs of lack of maintenance and evidently there are insufficient town funds to devote to road maintenance and litter collection and all the things that support an urban infrastructure.
We are being met at 7.30am tomorrow to be taken to the office for the first of our visits; these will be in Harare itself, a busy schedule has been set, organised by Ernest Mupugna (Regional Director) which will continue until Saturday. Just setting up a Trustee visit takes quite a lot of work so on the way here Helena and I read the Southern Africa Strategy document, the 2010 Review and a write up from Mark (Practical Action Finance Director) with recommendations following his recent visit here and visits to the projects in September.
No Comments » | Add your commentWhat access to energy means to one little girl
When I visited Zimbabwe, the different community representatives I met may have varied in age to the extreme but their views on why energy is vital remained very similar – apart from the man who jokingly said that having a hair salon would make his wife more beautiful!
Energy is vital for poverty reduction and fundamental for community development. Even the children recognise this, as illustrated beautifully in just one of the entries from a school essay competition in a village where we are working.
See what access to energy means to Patience Medeline from Zimbabwe
No Comments » | Add your commentHigh heeled shoes – their role in development
I’ve discovered a major problem with micro-hydro sites – they are nearly all on very steep hills. As I am a big woman with bad ankles this is not a good combination. It got even worse today when it rained and the site involved near vertical, slippy slopes of red mud. I thought of my old stiletto shoes with their built in crampons and sighed over my worn smooth trainers. Fortunately Farai was a gentleman and helped me down – it would have been just too embarrassing for all if I’d slid down on my bum by accident or on purpose (a gentle sitting slide has on occasion been my transit of choice when faced with steep hills in the UK – while walking in the countryside you understand, not shopping on a sloping high street). Thank You Farai!
Today we crossed into Mozambique to see Practical Action work just the other side of the border. At the moment Mozambique is noticeably poorer than the neighbouring area of Zimbabwe, although colleagues tell me that a year ago it was a prime shopping area for Zimbabweans when their shops had nothing.
The approach here has similarities and differences with Zimbabwe – there is still the emphasis on getting electricity to schools and clinics, but more of the sites will be in private hands, with the ‘owners’ and users each contributing to a revolving fund which will then pay for maintenance and finance the further expansion of the project.
Again I spoke with people who are looking forward to having better education and healthcare, much shorter walks to grinding mills, lighting and TVs. I am not sure until this visit that I had recognised the importance of TV, whether individually or community owned. One woman I spoke to today told me that she went to bed each evening between 7 and 8 pm as there was nothing to do and so she tried to sleep after her evening meal and listening briefly to the radio – I calculate that she is getting between 10 and 11 hours sleep each evening. Lovely occasionally but pretty dire if you sleep so long only out of boredom.
The men in southern Africa all want to be able to have a TV in their communities in time for the 2010 World Cup. The women talk of educating their children and maybe relaxing.
No Comments » | Add your commentLocation, Location in Zimbabwe
Today it was housing.
I live in a rather mixed area (code for having a cement works across the road). I have a house with two reception rooms, a large kitchen, two bathrooms and four bedrooms. No, this hasn’t morphed into Location, Location – if it had I wouldn’t have told you about the cement works. I think my house is nice but simple – I feel comfortable where I live, it’s not too posh to make me feel guilty. I live there with my husband and daughter.
Today I met families, some of more than 30 people, living in squashed conditions. Gogo, a woman the Practical Action project has helped, said to me: “I have 34 people in my family – they all live in my house. I have five rooms for 34 people – before the project I had only three. There is me, my children, my grandchildren and my grandchildren’s children. It is very hard to get houses. I have three daughters who have dead husbands, they had to come back when their husbands died. In our tradition when a man dies his family will throw his wife and children out and tell them to go back to their family. I have such a big family because of the deaths.”
34 people living in one house seemed impossible – so she invited me to go and have a look.
The old part of the house was tiny. “This is where my son lives with his family,” said Gogo pointing to a really small bedroom, “this is where my daughter lives with her kids,” pointing to a largish store cupboard, “and I sleep in here with the orphans,” this was the small living room cum kitchen. We then went to the new front of the house where Practical Action had built two new rooms and a veranda. The new part of the house was much bigger than the old and again we had the tour of rooms that were each home to one family.
“You really all sleep in here?” I said somewhat dismayed, and of course they did. They are quite proud of their new house, although of course they would like to extend more – and then I thought about how they used to live and how there was no way they would have all fitted in. It was impossible and it must have led to some terrible choices.
Gogo is a great lady – just like many other of the women I meet.
Now if anyone happens to know someone quite famous who writes about a boy living in a cupboard under the stairs, could you ask them to conjure up some magic and let the families of women like Gogo escape from their cupboards. At the moment they are grateful for somewhere safe and inside to sleep.
Margaret
No Comments » | Add your commentWhat’s Zimbabwe really like?
After nearly 10 years as Practical Action Communications Director, Zimbabwe was the only one of our offices I’d never had a reason to visit so when someone needed to collect information for a report on our renewable energy work I jumped at the chance.
Long, long flight with little possibility of sleep. Ethiopian Air are good (would recommend and by far the cheapest). But the only thing I know about the man who sat next to me for 8 hours is that he farts repeatedly in turbulance – you can’t really say anything can you? ‘Excuse me, do you mind, could you just, I happened to notice …’ NO! It’s not on to comment – Never. I couldn’t anyway. It was a very bumpy and smelly flight.
I’ve worked for Practical Action for nearly 10 years and this is my first visit to Zimbabwe. So far – 4 hours in – the thing that’s shocked me most is, on the surface, how normal it is. Great road from the airport no potholes – seemingly the President likes to travel that way and so it’s kept pristine. Few slums, few people selling or begging on the street. Suspect that the area around the airport is managed so as to give a good impression. Only problem so far is that difficulties with the telephone system meant there was confusion and my meeting this afternoon had to be cancelled. Frustrating but fine.
People reflect on the past and talk of a huge part of their focus being how do we get food, vital fuel, how do we keep safe but now there is a sense of progress even if a long, long way to go and a worry that things could stand still or even go backwards. I hadn’t realised that converting the currency to US $, while vital for stability, has caused problems for some.
Lots of pictures of President Mugabe everywhere – he is looking down on me now as I type – should I mind my Ps and Qs? (Does anyone know what that means?)
Tomorrow I get to interview Practical Action staff in Zimbabwe – programme leader Tinashe is something of a legend for his excellence in renewable energy so I am really looking forward to meeting him. On Wednesday I travel to the rural areas to meet the communities we work with in Guruve. Exciting!
I promised to try and update this blog each day I am away. Day 1 – today – I hope is the most boring. My first ever blog – I promise to get better. Do tell me what you would like to hear about and I’ll try and find out more and/or ask the people I meet.
Must go and try and get some sleep.
Margaret
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