0

What do papayas, principals and practical skills programs all have in common?

They’re all a part of the partnership that began in 2008 between imagine1day and the Lundin for Africa Foundation to support 33 rural communities  in creating a sustainable source of income to maintain and grow their primary schools! Here’s a snapshot of our progress so far:

In total we’ve built 13 child-friendly water points (nine shallow wells, one hand dug well, two spring extensions and one roof catchment) and three more are planned before the end of the year. With outputs of between 17,280 L/day and 691,200 L/day these water points are transforming communities by providing clean water for drinking and a source of irrigation for fruit trees and vegetable gardens.

Mango trees were added to our planting roster along avocado, lemon, orange and apple in addition to the guava and papaya trees we planted before.  60% of the shade trees and 54% of the fruit trees have survived. Hooray!  Once they mature, the fruit trees have the potential to generate over 600,000 ETB in revenue per year still leaving hundreds of kg of fruit left over in each community for them to eat. That’s an estimated $47,000 CND from just planting trees!   Planting cereal crops, and gardens of onions, peppers, spinach, potatoes and cabbage as well as fattening and breeding animals such as sheep and oxen are two other easy, sustainable ways that our communities are generating income for their children’s education.

We recently translated the life skills program training manual into Tigrinia (the local language) and found that the switch was a huge part of the program’s success. We tested one boy and one girl from each class in each school and discovered that the students were able to demonstrate an overall ability to apply life skills practically. That means they understood the importance of things such as washing hands, treating others with respect, and how to prevent adolescent pregnancy.  With 21 schools out of a total of 29 testing over 90% it is clear that it’s working!

A key discovery we made this year is that a strong PTA is led by a strong principal. So, in April we hosted a Principal Workshop which allowed principals from many different schools to network and problem solve based on common experiences and the imagine1day team also provided further training on things like PTA gender equality, child rights and financial handling.

We continued to work with communities to develop financial and management plans to ensure that the money generated by our schools is managed in a way that allows the school to be sustainable. We’ve seen that the more the community gets involved with their school, the more willing they are to contribute a small portion of their own financial resources to making it the best it can possibly be. Since this project began in 2008, the 33 communities have poured approximately 95,000ETB ($7,400 CND) of their own money back into their schools. That’s commitment!

When you break it down it is evident that imagine1day’s project with Lundin for Africa has had a tremendous impact in Tigray. We are thankful for LFA’s continued support and are excited to continue working with them in the future.

To learn more about Lundin for Africa and their work developing economic empowerment and sustainable livelihoods in communities throughout Africa, visit their website.