Planting roots and watching them grow: how one onion farmer’s life has been transformed

By Amadou Ba and Boubacar Sow

In Senegal, the dry northern area called the Fouta is known for migration; Fouta youth often leave in search of economic opportunities despite the potential of local agriculture. But for some, coming home turns out to be the best opportunity.

For 16 years, Aliou Kane moved around seeking economic opportunities outside of the Fouta and even outside of Senegal. However, in 1996 he decided to return to his Fouta roots to take up onion farming. Onions are a staple in Senegal and a principle ingredient in most traditional dishes. He started small, as do many subsistence Fouta farmers, with less than one hectare.

In 2006, Aliou began receiving technical, organizational and financial support from Counterpart International’s Food For Progress program funded by the U. S. Department of Agriculture. This support allowed Aliou to greatly expand his business from five to 15 and finally to 30 hectares. His yields have also improved: each hectare of Aliou’s land now produces five additional metric tons of food than it did before the intervention.

He was able to access $40,000 of credit from a local microfinance agency thanks to the guarantee funds put in place by Counterpart. Without these funds, he would not have had enough collateral to secure a loan. Today, Aliou pays his loans on time and has annual revenues of $138,000—more than seven times what he earned in 2007. He has been able to purchase four pumps for irrigation, two vehicles and a house.

“With training, I built my capacity to follow good planting techniques and business practices,” says Aliou. “This has allowed me to increase my production and revenues.”

These days, Aliou is focused on diversification and is now producing corn, rice, hot peppers and seeds on 10 additional hectares. He also has plans to enter into the livestock farming business. After receiving Food For Progress support to attend a national agriculture fair in 2012, Aliou focused his ambitions on formalizing his business in order to raise his profile in the eyes of the potential partners he meets at these national venues.

Thanks to his flourishing businesses, Aliou is well known in the Fouta and is the youngest village chief in his area. He has also been able to buy shares and invest in other local agriculture businesses.

Aliou wants to serve as an example to youth in his area who are thinking of seeking greener pastures elsewhere. He tells them, “I am actually doing much better financially now then I was when I was out of the country.”

This success story is featured on foodaid.org, a resource for the policy community and development practitioners to learn about U.S. food assistance programs.

November 30th, 2012 | Tags: credit, economic, farmers, Food for Progress, loan, microfinance, onion, Senegal, USDA | Category: Impact Stories | Leave a comment

Not Deaf to Corruption

By Jennifer Brookland

It’s difficult to discuss corruption when your language has no word for it.

The nonexistence of signs for words including “corruption,” “transparency” and “accountability” in Honduran Sign Language imply that deaf Hondurans have no place in the conversation about their country’s struggle for good governance.

Nonetheless, the approximately 100,000 Hondurans who are hearing impaired have plenty to say about such important topics.

One civil society organization in Honduras is making sure that the conversation about corruption is an inclusive one.

The Fundación Hondureña de Rehabilitación e Integración del Limitado (FUHRIL) uses financial and technical support from the Counterpart International-implemented Impactos program to serve as an interlocutor for people with disabilities to express themselves in favor of transparency and accountability in Honduras.

The Impactos program, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, aims to increase the transparency and accountability of public institutions in Honduras.

Too important for the silent treatment

Honduras ranked 129 out of 183 countries measured on Transparency International’s 2011 Corruption Perceptions Index, which also listed the nation’s “budget openness” as “scant or none.”

An especially damaging consequence of this corruption has been the state’s inability to protect its citizens from high rates of violent crime and gang activity, which earned the country the sad distinction of being named the world’s most violent country by the United Nations.

“Despite efforts of the deaf Honduran community and other organizations, to this date there are hearing-impaired people whom remain disregarded and ignorant of all national events going on,” says Orquidea Centeno, who lost her hearing at age 15. “We have no access to justice, we have no access to information and we are invisible.”

Sketching an inclusive future

With grant money received from Counterpart, FUHRIL recently launched a campaign called “Listening is more than hearing, we are not deaf to corruption.”

The campaign seeks to increase awareness of the limitations faced by the disabled, demand services and information for them, and communicate their ideas and proposals to fight corruption.

FUHRIL partnered with the daily nationally-distributed newspaper Diario La Tribuna, which agreed to publish a monthly full-page cartoon series and weekly news banner with the campaign´s content at no cost for 10 months.

It’s a step FUHRIL Director Yolanda Dominguez calls, "a concrete accomplishment at this stage of the campaign.”  

“The messages in these comic strips encourage good practices and values such as solidarity, respect and transparency,” says Dominguez.

The comic strips contain key messages that encourage those with disabilities to participate in civic actions aimed at fighting corruption. They take an inclusive approach in a place where those with disabilities are often marginalized and left out of the political conversation.

There is “total disregard towards the deaf community and the speed and subtlety with which corruption is positioned on a daily basis in the minds of our youth and children with or without disabilities,” says Dominguez.

FUHRIL’s campaign is already motivating and mobilizing people with disabilities to communicate their perspectives on issues such as the accountability of public officials.

Expanding the conversation

FUHRIL is also working with specialists—professors, designers and the Deaf Association of Honduras— to create visual interpretations of words such as "corruption," "transparency" and "accountability," whose creation will help deaf Hondurans demand good governance alongside their peers.

“Through the ‘Listening is more than hearing, we are not deaf to corruption’ campaign, my hope of a brighter future is reborn,” says Centeno. “My expectations through the project are, for us deaf people, to know about corruption, avoid and report it.”

By bringing all segments of the country’s population into the discussion on how to tackle corruption, organizations like FUHRIL hope they can deliver an inclusive message that Hondurans want good governance—and that authorities will hear that demand loud and clear.

November 28th, 2012 | Tags: | Category: Impact Stories | Leave a comment

Critically-needed food saves one mother’s child and wakes up a whole community

Counterpart International’s staff in Mauritania visited the village of Medine to monitor children’s health and found a little boy named Khané Mint Izidbih severely malnourished.

"He was pale, his eyes had no focus, and his mother Areyiba had no more hope," a Counterpart staff member recalled from that June 2010 visit.

After taking his height, weight and mid-upper arm circumference, Khané was referred to the health post. When the nearest health post did not have therapeutic food for malnourished children, Counterpart staff went to the regional capital to find him this medication.

Khane gradually gained weight and his progress was regularly followed by Counterpart staff. Although at 28 months old he has not fully recovered and remains moderately malnourished, Khané’s mother says he is steadily continuing to gain weight. With the rations he keeps receiving from Counterpart and the monthly check-ups, Khané’s mother is able to watch her son progress towards a healthy future.

"Counterpart woke us up," says Salka mint Sidaty, the vice president of a cooperative in Medine. "We were sleeping before Counterpart was here. Counterpart woke us up with behavior change communication sessions, and these health sessions."

Counterpart performs health check-ups - called Growth Monitoring Promotion (GMP) - in more than 160 communities in southern Mauritania.

During these sessions, community health workers screen children who are from six to 59 months old to determine their nutritional status. Weight and height measurements are used to classify them as healthy, moderately malnourished or severely malnourished. The community health workers also take mid-upper arm circumference to identify children who have wasting—an indicator of severe malnutrition and heightened risk of death.

If a child is moderately malnourished, he is enrolled in GMP sessions and receives monthly food rations to improve his nutrition. Severely malnourished children are referred to health posts to ensure they receive proper treatment.

Counterpart is currently carrying out a U.S. Agency for International Development Title II Multi-Year Assistance Program in more than 160 communities throughout four regions of Mauritania. The program has three components: maternal and child health and nutrition (MCHN), microenterprise and community development. Counterpart implements its MCHN component in collaboration with the Mauritanian Ministry of Health.

This success story is featured on foodaid.org, a resource for the policy community and development practitioners to learn about U.S. food assistance programs.

November 1st, 2012 | Tags: community health, community health workers, health, malnutrition, MYAP, nutrition | Category: Impact Stories | Leave a comment

Building an Incentive into Conserving the Land in Ethiopia

Abbe Edao (left) speaks to his community's Resource User Group. This group has helped rehabilitate nearly 2,500 acres of degraded land using watershed structures and replanting techniques. © David Snyder/Counterpart International.

The village of Beshera Chafa in Ethiopia’s Central Rift Valley is turning a wasteland into a profit center.

“We felt sad even looking at this area because it was so barren. You couldn’t see grass or trees or animals,” says Abbe Edao, Chairperson of the Beshera Chafa Peasant Association.

A year ago, Counterpart’s Ethiopian Ecotourism Development Program teamed with this community to rehabilitate 1,000 hectares (nearly 2,500 acres) in an area badly degraded by overgrazing, drought and erosion. (Watch a video on conserving land and creating livelihoods in Ethiopia >)

Edao and eight other villagers were elected to decide what to do with the community conservation area. They chose to close off the worst parts and let nature take over.

One year later, the trees look healthy. Hares hop and oribi gazelles run through the tall grasses.

The conservation area is now managed and monitored by a Resource User Group, or RUG – about 25 community members. The men and women are responsible for protecting the demarcated land. If cattle or unauthorized people enter, the RUG may enforce a fine of 10 birr, or 57 cents – half of which goes to the RUG members.

Once the land is rehabilitated, members of the RUG gain user rights, with the opportunity to begin sustainable income-generating activities, like beekeeping or selling the grass.

“It is only through this one year that we’ve seen all this change. And we hope that next year the trees will grow taller, the grass will grow taller, and my community will benefit from the land,” Edao says.

Watch a video on conserving land and creating livelihoods in Ethiopia >

October 24th, 2012 | Tags: Central Rift Valley, conservation, drought, erosion, ESTA, Ethiopia, overgrazing, replanting, RUG, trees, watershed management | Category: Impact Stories, Multimedia | Leave a comment

Afghan girls get a high school - and a chance

© David Snyder/Counterpart International.

By Jennifer Brookland

More than 230 girls in the Afghan village of Sofi Qala are about to benefit from an opportunity that could change the course of their lives. With the opening of a new high school, they will be able to continue their education, improve their literacy and even qualify for the university entrance exams.

“I was worried about what happen if I will not be able to complete high school and have access to pass the university entrance exams,” said one 24-year old housewife who was never able to progress past the ninth grade. With the new high school in town, she will be able to resume her studies, and hopes to one day become a teacher.

Although girls were permitted to go to school following the collapse of the Taliban regime, families in Sofi Qala still struggle to educate their daughters past secondary school – the equivalent of eighth or ninth grade.

Boys can commute several miles to attend classes in other villages, but it was too dangerous for girls to go to school. Parents feared they could be targeted by insurgents.

Women in Sofi Qala think their girls will be better mothers if they learn to read. A high school certificate will also make them more productive members of the community, they say. Some even dream of their daughters continuing their education and eventually becoming doctors or engineers.

It’s a lofty goal compared to the daily reality of most of the 300 families who eke out a living in this southeastern town. Seventy percent of them are classified as poor or very poor, with most relying on farming to earn their meager incomes. With a paucity of economic alternatives, there are few  ways besides agriculture to earn an income.

With limited options to continue past secondary school, most girls end up isolated in their homes, knitting rugs, embroidering and sewing clothes.

Representatives from Sofi Qala took their concerns to a community dialogue organized in February by Counterpart International’s partner organization Help the Afghan Children, and suggested an alternative. They suggested Sofi Qala’s secondary school be developed into a high school.

The issue was subsequently taken up at the Regional Policy Dialogue in Jawzjan Province.

The dialogues are part of Counterpart’s Initiative to Promote Afghan Civil Society, a U.S. Agency for International Development-funded program that works to create and promote a broader and deeper civil society infrastructure that involves and serves the true needs of the population.

Women were active at both the community and regional dialogues, processes that are themselves indicative of Afghan women’s growing willingness and capacity to advocate for their needs.

In this case, the needs of Sofi Qala’s girls were heard. Afghanistan’s Provincial Education Department agreed to expand the village’s secondary school into a high school they could attend.

Soon news of the new high school had spread throughout the village and the community was ecstatic.

“The existence of education facilities are so required to finish high school in my village and this fulfills my big wishes continuing my higher education,” says a girl who is attending classes at the newly-opened school.

The school now serves 231 girls and 272 boys, with lessons in math, science, Dari, Pashto, English and sports. There are currently 14 teachers, nine of whom are women.

But it has a long way to go. It still needs a building with six classrooms, 150 chairs and desks, and a sports ground, laboratory and library. It also needs toilets and potable water.

Despite official sponsorship, there has been no money allocated for the school by the Ministry of Education.

And despite so much community and government support for the project, the villagers also want to erect a wall around the school. They are very concerned for the girls’ security.

Nevertheless, demand for high school classes is huge on the part of girls who now see a window of opportunity for shaping their own futures, and for parents and teachers who want to help them get there.

October 11th, 2012 | Tags: Afghanistan, education, girls, Help the Afghan Children, IPACS II, school, Sofi Qala, USAID, women | Category: Impact Stories | Leave a comment