Category Archives: Blog

The Girl Effect

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Walter Schutz Secondary School students

Walter Schutz Secondary School students in Rotifunk

It’s September. School is starting again and I’m thinking of the Girl Effect.  Getting girls into secondary school in rural Sierra Leone, and keeping them there, is at the core of Sherbro Foundation’s work.

If I ever stop to think of why I put my personal effort into working on this, I only have to be reminded of one thing.

The Girl Effect.

The message is simple. “Invest in a girl, and she will do the rest.”

She’ll invest in her family and community.  With millions of girls in the world, that’s millions of chances to make the world a much better place.  I like those odds  – and return on my investment – when compared to most other development programs.

But I don’t need to explain it. This video says it all.   Click here:  The Girl Effect   

“If you change the prospects of an adolescent girl on a big enough scale, you will transform societies.”    

Mark Lowcock, DflD Permanent Secretary
Prosperity Girls High School 7th graders

Prosperity Girls High School 7th graders

You can be part of the Girl Effect transforming Rotifunk and Bumpeh Chiefdom, Sierra Leone.

Please contribute to Sherbro Foundation’s Girls Scholarship Fund.  Your $25 will pay school fees to send a girl to secondary school In Rotifunk for the year.

The school year is starting and she needs your help.

Click to Donate here

Donations from all countries are welcome through this Paypal link.

Why do people need a computer in rural Sierra Leone?

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What will people do with a computer in a rural area like Rotifunk when they have no electricity and no Internet service beyond spotty mobile phone coverage – if you have a smart phone. If most people have at best limited literacy, what does it matter if they have access to a computer?

My original motivation for getting PC’s to Rotifunk was to get job training skills into school programs there.  I especially wanted young girls to get a jump start on skills needed for good jobs in today’s economy.  That’s still a primary objective.

As I got more involved, I saw professionals and leaders already there in Rotifunk did not have computers. The Prosperity Girls High School principal, teachers, chiefdom administrators – all well educated and capable people were being held back by not having a computer to modernize documents and records, improve their productivity and have access to all the information that the Internet can provide.

But I soon found computer access in a rural area can do much more.  It starts with the smallest computer of all – the smart phone. With a smart phone and its Internet access, people can do a lot to improve their day to day lives.  Everyone.

If more than one person, that often where the cell phone cell is stronger.

If there’s more than one person, that’s often where the mobile phone signal is stronger.

When I made my first trip back to Sierra Leone in 2011 with friends, we observed that things largely looked the same as we had left off in the 70’s. Not encouraging.  Then we started seeing one important thing that had changed.  People were walking around with this thing in their ear and talking to themselves.  Just like at home, but we weren’t home.  Wait a minute.  Those were mobile phones everywhere.

The juxtaposition of mobile phones next to a mud house took a minute to register and get used to.  Especially a woman in a traditional lappa with a baby on her back, maybe cooking outside on three stone talking on a mobile phone.

This is not just yakking.  With limited incomes, it’s a pay as you go system.  You buy units from a local vendor and people use them carefully.  I had to get used to people otherwise effusively friendly, abruptly hanging up on me.  They’re conserving units.

So what do they use mobile phones for?  Many things.  In an area where roads are beyond miserable and public transportation infrequent and expensive on their incomes, you can do a certain amount of your day to day business and personal connections now by your phone. Like calling ahead to make sure a shop has the goods in stock you need for your local business or to resell in the market.  You can check prices while you’re at it and find the best price.  Maybe you can arrange to have your order delivered to you with someone you know and avoid the trip yourself.

Cell phone towers announce you're entering a small town.

Cell phone towers announce you’re entering a rural town or village – here Rotifunk.

Most women work by virtue of being small traders as they call it in the informal economy.  They buy goods in one place at a good price and sell in another. Phone orders and other requests are especially empowering for women.  The Internet and phones are good ways to level the playing field. It doesn’t matter who you are and what you look like. Money talks.  And you don’t have to leave your children or waste time you could instead use to do other chores for your family.

I’ve seen many applications for mobile phones now that mobiles have taken hold in Africa.  They involve getting fast and timely access to information, and avoiding costly and difficult trips on bad rural roads.

Farmers can call Agriculture extension services or other advisors to find out why their crops are doing poorly and get advice on what to do.

Health care is one of the most exciting uses of this “mini-computer.” When a woman goes into labor, a call can go to the nearest  health clinic to be ready for her, and where available, arrange for a vehicle to take her.  In a country with one of the highest maternal and infant mortality rates in the world, access to health services when needed is leading to dramatic improvements for mothers and infants.

Likewise, mothers can call clinics to consult with a nurse or community health officer about their family’s illness.  Hours of unnecessary delay can make all the difference when a small child has malaria or acute diarrhea, and parents can be advised on what to do by phone.

Texting health messages to rural clinic health practitioners was noted as one successful measure in averting a replay of last year’s major cholera epidemic in Sierra Leone when hundreds died.  The rainy season is cholera season.  Rains were bad this year, but cholera incidence was not.  Texts went out alerting clinics on symptoms to watch for and what to do.

Banking and paying bills by phone is the next innovation in Africa and coming to Sierra Leone. Traditional banking dings poor people twice.  Bank account minimums and transaction fees are cost prohibitive for people living on $2 a day. Then you have to pay for public transportation to get to a bank, since villages and most small towns have no bank.  Rotifunk only last month had their first small credit union type bank open.

Now, pay by phone services are starting to pop up.  You can pay bills using the same mode as buying call units.  You give a local vendor the information on who you need to pay and how much, pay cash and they transmit the funds to pay your bill. Services are starting that let you use your phone like a debit card. You avoid bank fees – and can stay off those miserable roads wasting your time.  People will need to get used to these services. But the cost-benefit seems clear to encourage use as they become available.

Sierra Leone’s journalists even created “citizen journalists” in the country’s 2012 Presidential election with mobile phones. The government promised free, fair and transparent elections.  So, journalists gave mobile phones to average citizens to report back real time what was going on in their remote polling place.

This video gives an overview of how rural, low income people’s lives are made better with that mini-computer, the mobile phone.  Mobile for Development life stories.

CNN notes other innovative solutions mobile phones made available to people in Africa in their article: Seven ways mobile phones have changed lives in Africa. 

Yes, some of this is just using phone service, and you don’t even need a smart phone.  But others connect computerized services by phone.  And once people are comfortable and proficient with using mobile phone functionality, it’s not a huge step up to using a computer.  And a computer can bring educational, productivity and job skill opportunities to a rural area.

I watched an illiterate girl sell me mobile phone units in Rotifunk.  She had no trouble punching all those numbers into her mobile phone that then connected with a computer that activated my phone with call units. She mastered this in no time because it was a job for her.

I look at mobile phones as the training ground for introducing IT technology to a country ready and willing to use it.

The Computers Have Arrived. Who’s first to use them?

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Fifty laptop computers arrived in Rotifunk a week ago.  The shipment generously donated by Schneider Electric and TIP Capital were picked up from the shipping company’s warehouse in Freetown, and carried to Rotifunk by car.  Our dream of a computer lab for this rural town is starting to take shape.

This 77 year old student is a fast learner.

This 77 year old student is a fast learner.

A few things I found needed to be worked out.  After anxiously opening the boxes, they found they wouldn’t turn on. Someone realized the battery is discharged after sitting in a ship for a month.  This means carrying them to a house with a generator to recharge in this town with no electricity.  When they started, a message popped up about wanting to do a WIndows 7 update.  But in a town with no Internet access, you can’t receive automatic updates.  There’s way to handle this, too, in Sierra Leone, and someone was coming from the capital with a Windows 7 program disc to do their magic.

School’s been out for summer break and teachers are just returning to Rotifunk from their holidays to start the new school year.  I called Teacher Osman Kamara who volunteers with the Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation (CCET) – the new owners of the computers – to hear how it was going.  Osman had not yet arrived in Rotifunk himself, but said they will now be gearing up to start computer literacy classes.

In the meantime, some adults have been coming forward expressing their desire to learn to use a computer.  Really, I asked.  Like who?  I was interested to hear which people were among the first to make their interest known.

One is the chief Imam, Osman said.  The chief Imam is the leader of the community mosque.  I thought, well, ministers need to write and keep sermons, so an Imam must do the same.  Yes, Osman said, And he needs to keep written records and make certificates for things like marriage licenses.  So, he wants to learn to do this on a computer.

They’ve acquired a printer and can now print things for teachers and other users – like a marriage certificate for the Imam to present to a newlywed couple. Or exams teachers have prepared. It didn’t take long to learn that printer ink is not cheap.  They will need to charge a small printing fee for these requests. That’s far cheaper than going to the capital to use a computer or printer, when you add in transportation costs and a two day trip. 

I can visualize the CCET office quickly becoming the local Kinko’s or Staples of Rotifunk.  Unfortunately, now run with a generator that’s another expense for fuel.  We’re keeping a solar energy system as a priority on our project list.

Chief Caulker early on expressed interest for the chiefdom clerks to learn how to computerize their records.  They are starting a systematic system for recording births and deaths in the chiefdom.  Computer records will be perfect to not only maintain data, but to start making spreadsheet reports on their statistics.  Likewise, they keep land use records on who has rights to parcels of land and when they acquired these. 

I listened to a land dispute case in the chief’s daily palaver court in a small village last February.  People bring their disputes and complaints before the chief for settlement as in a court.  In this case, the land was on the border between small villages and no one could remember when or if the person claiming land rights had gotten them.  Who’s the oldest man in this area? asked Chief Caulker.  A motorcycle taxi was sent to collect him in hopes of getting an objective and accurate reading on this. The day will soon be here when the chief could make a cell phone call back to Rotifunk for the computer data base on this.  Well, if the village has a cell phone signal, which this one did not.  But that will come, too.

The wheels of my brain start turning.  When you move beyond computer literacy lessons and into actual applications, they need data management procedures.  Do they understand the need to back up data, and how will they do this?   A memory stick or blank CD will work initially, but they’ll soon need something like a remote hard drive. Mr. Kemoh, one of the teachers who studied IT technology will surely understand this. 

I asked an enterprising young Rotifunk man how he would use a computer if he had one. He would start a business to transfer songs to people’s cell phones.  Playing music on your cell phone is hot in Sierra Leone.  And you’d be surprised how many people have cell phones.  People who can download the latest songs on a computer can have a thriving business transferring these to people’s phones for a small fee.

Movies and videos are of course equally popular. They also open a whole new window on the world for people who have been to date isolated.  With a computer and video projector I brought last February, we could show movies in the small village we stayed in of 25 homes. (Had to bring a generator, too, of course.) I brought a number of videos where children were lead characters in hopes of being both entertaining and educating.

What I hadn’t counted on was American English being such a barrier. When the subject matter is culturally different and the language is different than yours, or just hard to understand, you can imagine interest falls off quickly.  How long could you watch a “foreign film” with no subtitles.  Action films of course, do better.  I found the early Harry Potter films hold universal appeal.  Even when we fried the video projector with power surges coming thru the generator.  (Only the fuse I hope.) Rather than give up, we just turned the computer screen towards the crowd gathered outside the house.  With some small speakers I brought, that sufficed for our village cinema.  The kids were happy.

Some adults just want to learn to use a computer because it’s now there. You may be asking who that handsome guy is typing away in the picture at the top of this story.  It’s Chief Caulker’s Uncle Stalin.  Seventy seven year old Uncle Stalin wanted computer lessons when we were together in a village.  He had been a bursar on a freighter carrying goods to and fro from England in his younger days.  That’s where he had learned to type. 

I had panicked when I bought PC’s to take two weeks before my last trip and found they were loaded with Windows 8.  I had to quickly teach myself how to use them to teach others.  In two lessons, Uncle Stalin had mastered Windows 8 basics. He could turn on the computer and start up, locate the last Word document he made and start typing a letter without help.  He was thrilled, and so was I.

It’s not too late for him – or for anyone in Rotifunk – to meet their aspirations using a computer. Yes, we have some ground to make up.  But my experience so far would indicate, that’s not going to be a big problem.

 

 

 

 

 

Women taking the lead in Sierra Leone

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I continue to see stories of women coming into their own and taking the lead in Sierra Leone  Here’s one I enjoyed a lot.

The first woman president of the Sierra Leone Football Association, Isha Johansen is working to do more than line the pockets of team owners. As one of only two woman presidents of national football associations in the world, I would say she is making her mark.

Isha Johansen, Sierra Leone Football Association president

Isha Johansen, Sierra Leone Football Association president

http://www.fifa.com/aboutfifa/organisation/homefifa/news/newsid=2159022/

Of course, “football” in most of the world means soccer to Americans.  (Maybe that’s why things are more civilized for Sierra Leone football.)

The FIFA story linked here notes Isha’s goals include using football to get youth into school, and to stay in school.  And, need I say, promoting football for women in Sierra Leone.

This picture and story come from the website of FIFA, Fédération Internationale de Football Association, the international governing body of association football.

50 Computers Have Shipped Bound for Rotifunk

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Fifty computers are on a container ship as I write this steaming its way from New Jersey to Sierra Leone and the grateful people of Rotifunk. These will be the first computers that allow The Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation to set up a computer literacy program and start teaching regular computer classes for Bumpeh Chiefdom.

This will not just provide computer skills, but skills to give the people of Rotifunk a shot at the 21st century job market. Skills to modernize school and chiefdom administration.  Skills to help people start or expand small businesses.

This is the dream that Prosperity Girls High School Principal Rosaline Kaimbay and I had two years ago when I made my first trip to Rotifunk in over 35 years and first met her.  Prosperity Girls was just finishing their second academic year after the school was founded in 2009.  She then had 67 girls in 7th and 8th grades – or as they say Junior Secondary School 1 and 2. The school now has four grades and triple the students. 

As Principal Kaimbay and I talked about her goals for the school in July 2011, we acknowledged that most of these girls were unlikely to go on to college.  They need vocational training programs in the school to give students practical job skills.  We quickly agreed computer training was top of the list.  Whether going to college or being a clerk in a shop, people today need computer skills to excel.

By next month at this time, our dream will become reality.

This dream has been made possible by two generous U.S. companies that I serendipitously met in Cincinnati – Schneider Electric and TIP Capital.

I went on the spur of the moment to a preview showing of the new PBS series, Half The Sky, about the plight of women and girls in the developing world that was given at the public library. Jenny Brady, Schneider Electric employee and CARE volunteer was leading the showing and a discussion afterwards.  She encouraged the audience to not just watch the video, but to find a real project to help a girl or a woman like those we had just seen.  Progress starts with one person here willing to help one girl/one woman somewhere in another country struggling to move her life forward.

OK, I said to myself, raise your hand and let people know you have such a project, and in Sierra Leone, one of the countries just profiled in the Half the Sky video. My “project” then was a discussion with a principal in a small town on the other side of the world, and a piece of paper she and her teachers prepared with their objectives for a computer lab for the school and the community. 

Teaching lab by day, Internet café by night.  Never mind they have no Internet service and no electricity. That was part of our dream for Rotifunk, too.

schneider elec_logoJenny liked this project herself.  She invited me to another Half the Sky showing where she brought the Schneider Electric HR manager, who I spoke with. She liked it, too, and took it back to Schneider Electric management as a proposal to send laptop computers to Rotifunk. 

The project now had legs.

This is an example of the kind of social responsibility effort I found Schneider Electric is globally known for as a multinational corporation in the world of energy management and sustainable development. They are recognized as one of the Top 100 World’s Most Ethical Companies.

TIP Capital logoSchneider leases their office IT equipment from an IT leasing company, TIP Capital.  They would get refurbished computers from TIP, who very generously agreed to sell these at cost and pay shipping charges to the New Jersey port. Giving up their profit on 50 computers was another very kind donation made by TIP.

As we were getting this underway, the Boston marathon tragedy occurred.  A horrific vicious circle of hatred where just two people wreaked incredible havoc and heartache.  How fortunate I remember thinking that I am instead involved in a circle of virtue, where one person’s desire to help on a compelling need enlists the help of another, who in turn draws in another person, and another.

Other donations have followed as people have heard of the project and seen it taking shape.  But a huge thanks goes out to the people at Schneider Electric and TIP Capital for the being the first ones to step up and say, I want to help on this.

A lot has happened in the last year and the project has grown.  More teachers have come to Rotifunk for the growing Prosperity Girls High School and formed an all-volunteer community development Nonprofit they call The Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation (CCET).  I found other worthwhile projects needing support in Rotifunk on a later trip, and formed the Sherbro Foundation. 

The computer lab project has already grown in anticipation of receiving 50 computers.  CCET and Sherbro Foundation decided we should open computer training to more of the community beyond one girls schools.  There are four secondary schools in Rotifunk with girl and boy students needing computer skills.  There are school graduates in town that would like the opportunity learn computer skills for their own career development. There’s other adults who want the chance to learn to use a computer, or who have basic skills, but no access to a computer in town.  People now have to go the capital or another larger town with an Internet café to use a computer.

Even the women in the adult literacy class who are just learning to read and write their own names are excited at the prospect of learning to use a computer.  If primary school kids learn to use them, why not these women?  I say more power to them.  In this way, I hope computer classes will serve as an incentive for all students, young and old, to continue in school and keep learning.

Computer based training via DVD’s can also be a boost for students trying to master basic subjects like math and English grammar.

Paramount Chief Caulker has given CCET a building to use for their office and classes.  Sherbro Foundation has contributed some money to pay for a local carpenter to build office furniture and tables to hold classes.  And, next month, they will be firing up their own computers.

It’s one thing to learn to use a computer, but what do people then do with a computer in rural Africa?  More on that in another post.

If you would like to become part of this circle of virtue going out to the small town of Rotifunk, Sierra Leone, you can by using the on-line donation button to the right of this website.  There’s still plenty to do. 

We need simple things.  $15 will buy a computer bag to store and carry laptops. $25 will buy five gallons of fuel to run a small generator for hours of charging time. Educational DVD’s will help, like math and typing tutorials and programs like National Geographic and PBS.  Used DVD’s you’ve outgrown are fine. Let us know on Contact Us for that.

Top of the list though is a long term plan to provide power for this new computer lab to charge computers and light classrooms at night.  Part of the initial dream is still on the table – to fund a solar power system for the computer lab and to run adult education classes at night.

We haven’t given up on that part of the dream. It’s still growing.

It’s really raining! Bridge collapses

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This week is typically the peak of the rainy season in Sierra Leone, and it’s really raining this year.   A main bridge in Freetown collapsed yesterday under the heavy rain and a landslide.  Several people are known dead, and more likely dead with homeless normally sheltering under the bridge.

This bridge connects main routes in the capital, and will further snarl traffic in the already gridlocked city.  The bridge is called a relic of the colonial days, and is perched on one of Freetown’s many steep hillsides that descend down to the bay.

Many U. S. cities feel they are in a dilemma in not being able to repair or replace aging bridges and infrastructure.  In comparison, Sierra Leoneans would feel privileged to have the bridges we have.

You can see pictures of the King Jimmy bridge collapse here.  The road descends to the King Jimmy Market near a wharf.  It’s a popular place to buy fresh produce brought to town from the countryside.  http://africansuntimes.com/2013/08/sierra-leone-landslide-destroys-historic-slave-area-king-jimmy-bridge-causing-fatalities/

It’s also a historic area where slaves leaving Sierra Leone for the New World were brought to the wharf as their departure point.  They usually were taken to Bunce Island, a major slave fort now in ruins on a small island in the bay to await the sale sealing their fate.

Another bridge collapse occurred in February on my route from Rotifunk to the capital. We had planned to take the Mabang bridge back to the capital on a Saturday morning prior to my flight home on Sunday.  Late Friday afternoon Chief Caulker received word that the bridge had collapsed under a heavy truck trying to cross it.  Fortunately, Principal Kaimbay had just safely crossed twenty minutes earlier in a small vehicle.

People blamed the Mabang collapse on the truck.  I said, the truck is bringing goods upcountry, and that means business.  If you want development and bigger business in this area, you need a bigger bridge.  It wasn’t the truck’s problem; the bridge was inadequate for the people who needed to use it. The bridge creaked and groaned when we had crossed a few weeks earlier in a car.  We literally inched our way over loose boards placed length-wise to strengthen the old bridge surface with its many gaps.  It was fightening, especially knowing we were perched 20+ feet in the air and crossing in the dark.

Chief Caulker paused on hearing the news of the collapse that Friday last February.  He then quietly leaned towards me and said, people don’t know how hard we fought to protect the bridge from rebel control during the war.  Four lives were lost, one my cousin.  The bridge is at a strategic point and rebel control would have given them a clear line onto the capital.

So, now the bridge long overdue for rebuilding was lost to overuse. And the people of Rotifunk must today take alternate feeder roads to get to the main highway that goes to the capital.  That adds one to one and half hours onto to their already four hour long trip to Freetown – a city that’s only 55 miles away.  Well, that was in the dry season.  The chief told me two weeks ago it took him eight hours to reach Rotifunk.  That probably includes over an hour to get through Freetown’s traffic gridlock.

Canoes crossing where the Mabang bridge collapsed

Canoes crossing where the Mabang bridge collapsed

Or, people can risk taking a canoe across the river past the collapsed bridge, and pick up another public transportation vehicle on the other side.  The cost of the trip is up significantly either way you go.  You can take the longer detour in one vehicle, or pay two vehicles with the river crossing.  Either way, people who can hardly afford the normal trip, are penalized with extra cost on top of extra time to now make the trip.

The government promised a temporary pontoon type ferry of the type I used 35 years ago.  Fifty five gallon drums are strapped on a platform big enough to hold a small truck. A cable spans the river and you are pulled across – by hand.  Five+ months later, there is still no ferry.

One of my Rotifunk colleagues, Alpha, passed on recent Facebook pictures of the collapsed bridge crossing. The river swollen with the heavy rains is running fast with strong currents, and crocodiles have been noted now in the rainy season.

His caption:  “We are still going through this deadly situation. No ferry, no bridge construction.”

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=530494173686391&set=a.204859449583200.51046.100001774385887&type=1&theater 

Two weeks ago he posted: “Here, we were dragged by heavy current of water underneath the suspended part of Mabang bridge. It was horrible. The boat captain did not make it up to pull the boat. I took the paddle from him and captain the boat. Thank God we were saved.”

Most would say climate change is increasing the rains over and above the usual monsoon level rain.  How rainy is rainy?  Here in Cincinnati, we’ve had a year with a lot of rain.  We hit 30 inches now for the year to date, with 27.5 inches the norm.  We’ll easily hit the 42 or so inches normal for the year.

Freetown is the wettest part of Sierra Leone, being the western-most peninsula of the western-most country in West Africa.  It’s the first place to catch all the prevailing winds blowing in from the Atlantic Ocean – and with those winds, all the rain.  The city gets 175 inches/year, with most of that falling June – September.  July and August are the rainiest, each month bringing in over 40 inches.  That’s more than Cincinnati gets for the whole year in one month.

Road outside Rotifunk in last year's rainy season.

Road outside Rotifunk in last year’s rainy season.

Rotifunk used to get “only” about 120 inches per year.  These days, who knows.  When you’re faced with traveling on roads like this, does it matter if it’s 120 or 130?!

I remember this week in Sierra Leone very well.  It’s my anniversary.  Our Peace Corps group arrived  in-country on August 9.  It’s also the week the rain seems to reach the peak of its crescendo over the past three months, and it rains 24 hours a day almost without a break for seven days.  That’s what you call rain.

Let’s pray the Mabang ferry is installed soon, and this new hardship for the people removed.  In the meantime, the silver lining is that all that rain is what’s making the rice grow.

Sierra Leone Devil Dancing – People love it

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When I checked my Sierra Leone videos and slide shows on YouTube this week, I was amazed to see the one on devil dancing in Rotifunk had passed 4000 views in ten months.  That in itself is not so remarkable.  What surprised me more was viewers had come from 100 countries.  This video  I put up just to entertain friends and family hit 4224 views this week from 100 countries.

Goboi devil dances in Rotifunk.

Goboi devil dances in Rotifunk.

What makes people drawn to devil dancing? It makes sense that half the views come from the U.S., followed by U. K., Canada, Netherlands and Australia.  There are plenty of former Volunteers like me, and lots of Sierra Leone and West African expats in these countries.  But why would two people hit Like in Turkey? Why 25 views in Greece?  Why eleven in Brazil and nine in Venezuela.  Why Indonesia, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Caymen Islands and Afghanistan?  OK, maybe there are Western soldiers of West African descent in Afghanistan.

This video doesn’t have my name on it, nor Sherbro Foundation.  Only a pseudo name – Salone Arlene. You can view it here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScHVE2B_pHk

Everyone enjoys Sierra Leone devil dancing.  The drumming has an infectious beat. The devils are completely covered to show no sign of the human under a raffia costume disguise that’s flying around with their wild dancing.  It’s exotic. It’s colorful. It’s festive.

It has a nuance of the unknown and the forbidden for Westerners. Or based on the global YouTube viewers, I should say for non-Africans.  What do you do if the devil comes to you? They are leaders in the secret society and command respect and obedience from society members.  Some male devils draw fearful respect from women.

It’s hard to explain “devils” to Westerners.  Devil is no doubt a bad translation to English for what these secret society figures stand for.  They’re not evil. Their purpose is not in doing bad things to people, at least not if you stay in line with the norms of behavior for the secret society and community.

That’s my best understanding of devils and the secret societies they represent.  They’re there to supervise and maintain good behavior and cultural norms in small communities that operated long before the colonial powers brought westernized forms of “law and order.”  Even today, there’s very little, if any government presence in villages and small towns.

Secret societies have long maintained behavior considered proper for their community.  It goes well beyond what we would consider the domain of police in our country, who address criminal acts and unacceptable behavior.  i.e., disorderly conduct.  African secret societies foster good behavior. They teach and enforce positive social and sexual norms; they moderate political activity (the local or traditional kind of politics, anyway.) 

The men’s and women’s societies help keep peace and harmony in their communities, and traditions and customs live on through their schools for young initiates and their ceremonies.  No holiday or special event is complete without a show of devil dancing.  The event in my video was to celebrate the first sports meet held by Prosperity Girls High School, a big community event in a rural town.

Devils are the visible manifestation of the secret society and its leaders.  They’re not really unique to West Africa.  I remember going to a Founder’s Day kind of parade when I lived in Belgium.  The town celebrated their origins going back to the 1200’s with a parade that included ten foot creatures that were men covered in costume on stilts with a huge, somewhat menacing paper mache mask on.  They called them puppets. 

A Belgian friend explained to me the puppets go back to medieval times when townships were first taken over by foreign kings and emperors.  The emperor would visit occasionally to reinforce his power over the local people, and parades and ceremonies would ensue.  This was the chance for the locals to come out with their huge and slightly menacing “puppets” to symbolically let the emperor know he may have power, but so do they.   How did Sierra Leone devils behave when the British colonial governor came to visit?

Puppets, devils – whatever you call them, when they come out to parade and dance today, it’s festive and a time to celebrate local culture.  I thought you might enjoy seeing this video from the Prosperity Girls first sports meet.

Arlene enjoying the devil dancing at the Prosperity Girls sports meet

Arlene enjoying the devil dancing at the Prosperity Girls sports meet

There’s a few still slides (no sound) at the beginning showing the Mokebie dance troupe marching into town from their village.  Then the video begins with drumming and singing.  The big Goboi devil from the men’s society does his dance about a minute in; stick with it as he really gets going as he continues.  There’s a woman Sampa dancer at the end.  I could imagine her getting a standing ovation if she was on America’s Got Talent.

If you can explain why people in 100 countries go to this video on YouTube, please let me know.  That part I would like to know.

But are they happy?

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This month we had American Independence Day when we (should) reflect on our country’s many freedoms and gifts, including the right to the “pursuit of happiness.” After spending time in Sierra Leone of late, I’ve thought more about what constitutes happiness.  Sierra Leoneans are known for being warm people and smiling – a lot.  But are they happy?

Westerners seem fixated on pursuing their own personal happiness.  Books abound on how to find happiness.  We have the Happiness Project, Authentic Happiness, even the Dalai Lama’s The Art of Happiness. Time Magazine’s cover story on this cleared up one thing.  Our Founding Fathers weren’t referring to each individual’s pursuit of happiness when they signed the Declaration of Independence.  Rather, they meant a government should be charged with providing an environment that fosters the happiness of its citizens; that gives you the opportunity to freely embark on your own pursuit.  The rest is up to you.

The country of Bhutan has gone a step farther with defining the “Gross National Happiness Index”, and how they as a government will measure the wellbeing of their citizens. They feel governments should be accountable not only for economic prosperity (GDP), but also for the general welfare and happiness of their citizens (GNH Index).  ie., why have economic prosperity unless the average citizen is better off.  http://www.grossnationalhappiness.com/articles/

Sounds good to me.  It’s an especially good message for developing countries to not get stuck on the treadmill of ever increasing GDP to the exclusion of their citizen’s welfare, and, well, happiness.

On any country index of wellbeing and happiness measures, Sierra Leone ranks near the bottom.  At least as measured by macro-measures like per capita income, child mortality rate, etc. Extreme poverty is not a happy place to be.

But what about individuals – real people.  These are some of the sunniest people I’ve met anywhere.  Sierra Leone has been called the Land of Smiles. As Westerners coming from the land of grumps, where people feel they never have enough, you are literally basking in the sunshine of the smiles of Sierra Leoneans.  Their singing and dancing.  Their strong sense of community and family.  But I’ve been wondering, with all the hardship in their lives, are they happy?  So, I decided to ask.

On my last trip, I went with the Paramount Chief and his family to spend two weeks in their ancestral village while they started preparing the rice swamps for next season’s planting.  This is a remote village of about 200 people and 25 houses.  I came with no organized group as a buffer or filter – no church mission, no NGO, no visiting ministry delegation.  Just them and me.  As guest of the chief, I was legitimized.  I was seen as OK to talk to.  In a village like this, there’s plenty of time to relax and talk.

They just came back from working 6 hours in the rice swamp & can still smile.

They just came back from working 6 hours in the rice swamp in the hot sun & can still smile.

So I asked people in a poor village, in one of the lowest income districts of one of the poorest countries in the world – what makes you happy.  I thought I better first get clear on a working definition of happiness here. This usually led to discussion of whether they had enough of what would make them happy, or, on the other hand, what they dislike or fear (unhappiness). Here’s some of the people I met.

Hawa, age 35, was born here.  She, her mother, and previously, her grandmother have been small traders, selling farm goods in bigger towns and markets.  She wants her daughter to get an education and be a nurse.  She would be happy when she has money to build a better house.  She also likes to be a business partner with her husband growing rice and making palm oil to sell in the city.  She’s proud when she gets what she needs, like repairing her house in the rainy season to not leak, and sending her daughter to school. She fears being poor. If you’re sick, you can’t go to the hospital without money.

Nurse Adama is happy she safely delivered another baby at the village health clinic.

Nurse Adama is happy she safely delivered another baby at the local health clinic.

Mary, age 30, was born here and is married to a farmer. She makes banga (smoked fish) and palm oil.  It’s hard for her because she doesn’t have money for public transportation to take her things to market where she can earn more. Her family had to flee during the war and live for a year in the bush, collecting wild yams, bananas and fish, and slept on the ground.  People got some money after the war to come back and rebuild, but not enough for a zinc roof.  She has five children, aged 5 to 15, and feels good when she can educate them.  Then they can take care of her in her old age. She hates poverty, sickness like malaria and elephantiasis, and thieves.

Sembu Bendu, boat captain.

Sembu Bendu is happy as boat captain.

Sembu is a 45 year old man and captain of the paramount chief’s boat that operates like a weekly bus on the river to take people to the big Saturday market in Rotifunk.  He was born here, and has a wife and child in Freetown.  He is happy that he could return here after the war with a paid job, and one that he enjoys.  He’s also happy that he’s healthy.  He needs a zinc roof, a better health clinic and new outboard motor.

Abdul is 36 and came from another village to work for the paramount chief.  He lost his parents during the war and never went to school.  He likes hard work and enjoys planting rice.  He does whatever is needed on the farm, like climbing palm trees for coconuts and tapping palm wine.  He has three children, including an 18 year old boy who helps on the farm.  He’s happy when he has money for a good house, food and can pay school fees for his kids. He’s proud when the chief trains him to do work on the farm or sends him on errands.  He likes good clothes. He fears sickness and when married women flirt with him.  (Adultery is punishable with a stiff fine in this chiefdom.)

Masiry, oldest woman in village on her front porch with Arlene.

Masiry, oldest woman in the village on her front porch with Arlene.

Masiry is 70 and the oldest woman in the village.  She came with her husband over forty years ago to farm for the chief’s father.  She has three sons and two daughters, most of who are in Freetown.  She wants her children to be teachers, lawyers and even president.  One daughter finished high school and runs a small business in Liberia.  Most women voted in the last election and she was happy there was no violence. She will be happy if this president does well for his country.  She enjoys when she can do business, buying rice and palm oil here to sell in Freetown where she can double the price.  She’s proud to have a farm and be able to work it.  With more money, she would pay for her children to get more education.  Then they can take care of her when she’s old.  (Or older!)

Town Chief Ali Kamara in front of his house.

Town Chief Ali Kamara in front of his house.

Chief Ali, at 70 is the oldest man in the neighboring village a half mile away and the town chief.  He was born there, as were his father and grandfather.  He has fond memories of village life as a child, when he and his friends fished and sang and “behaved like devils.”  He had at least 15 girlfriends as a young man. When asked what’s difficult about now being town chief, he said collecting taxes and settling woman palaver cases. When husbands have girlfriends it’s the worst.  He laughed, saying he used to do the things he now has to give fines for (as adultery).  He’s happy he has good health and is strong  enough to still be a rice farmer with his children.  He has fifteen children, the oldest 48 years old and eight that are still in school.  When asked if the things that make you happy change over time, he said he’s only happy with a good house with a zinc roof that doesn’t leak in the rain, and when his children come to see him.

I don’t find people to be all that different in other cultures and countries.  Most people are looking for the chance for a decent job that pays enough for housing and daily needs, to educate their children, have good health and access to health care when they don’t.  And a peaceful town where they can live free of crime. 

With the economic downturn and natural disasters of recent years, maybe the developed and under-developed countries have come closer together in what makes them happy.  They want the basics to live comfortably and have their family and friends around them.

Most people I know who go to Sierra Leone, one of the poorest countries in the world, feel uplifted after their visit. It isn’t so much because while there they feel they “did good” (altho hopefully they did that). It’s because they have taken in all the smiles, warmth, feeling of community, and celebrations of Sierra Leone.  When the music starts, the dancing begins.

Singing & dancing in the village on one of our first nights there.

Singing & dancing in the village on one of our first nights there.

Are Sierra Leoneans happier than Americans? Or are they sadder? Who really knows.  I do think Sierra Leoneans have a more realistic understanding that unhappiness will visit them.  It’s not if, but when. That’s reality for them.  But, in the meantime, they smile.  They don’t act as if they’re entitled to be happy and behave like victims when unhappiness does come their way as many Americans do; the way many Westerners lament, why me? Or dwell on some unhappy event long after it’s past.

So, when you’re not being visited by unhappiness this day or week or year – why not be happy? Why not smile like a Sierra Leonean?  Smile, and maybe you, too, will feel happy.

Adult Literacy Program Has Started

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Adult literacy classes organized by The Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation (CCET) in Rotifunk started in May- June.  Here’s a picture of some of the adult learners in a lesson at one of the local primary school buildings.

Adult Literacy students in primary school classroom

Adult Literacy students in Rotifunk primary school classroom

These adult students are women typically in their 30’s with little to no literacy.  As small farmers and market traders, mothers and perhaps single parents, their lives are as full as working women everywhere.  But they are committing themselves to gain new skills that will help improve their small businesses and allow them to take bigger roles in supporting their children’s education.  You can read more about these women and the literacy program CCET is customizing for their needs here: adult-literacy-what-do-they-really-need-to-know/ .

Classes will take a few weeks break now.  It’s planting time for farmers and vegetable gardeners, and these students need to focus on getting their crops in and off to good start as the rainy season moves to a peak.  It’s also Ramadan, the annual month of prayer and fasting for the Muslim students.  These women need to be home cooking in late afternoon and preparing for their family breaking the daily fast at sundown. This is when adult classes would normally be taught – after the day’s work is done and before it gets too dark to see in this small town with no electricity.

The adult literacy instructors from CCET need a break, too.  They are teachers at Prosperity Girls High School, and just completed an intense couple months of preparing students for exams and conducting exams.  They need time off for holiday and to visit their families living in other towns.

Teaching can be a bit hard in the peak of the rainy season anyway.  I’m sitting in my greenhouse as I write this and listening to the rain drumming on the glass above me.  We’ve had unusually heavy rain for July in Ohio.  But this is nothing like the monsoon rain in Sierra Leone’s lowland plains where 100-120 inches a year is the norm, falling all in a seven month period.

Today’s rain is bringing back memories of trying to teach in Rotifunk in July and September when the skies opened and dumped a solid white curtain of rain on the metal roofs of classroom buildings.  No one could hear you when the rain was like horses galloping over your head.  You had to just pause and wait for it to pass before resuming the class.  A break in classes right now for Mother Nature is in order.

I smiled when I saw the above picture of adult students perched on short primary school benches with legs stretched out in front of them, intent on their lesson.  The teacher doesn’t have to keep control of a room of fidgety teen students here.  These women want to be here. They’ve been asking for classes to resume their education after ten or twenty years’ break, or to just begin now.  I can’t wait to see how they progress come September.

Tree Nursery – see them grow

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CCET-SL volunteer and local teacher Mr. Sennessy (left, blue shirt) and Mr.s Kaimbay, CCET-SL Director and local principal, left, watch as a young volunteer prepares her seedling bag.

CCET-SL volunteer and local teacher Mr. Sennessy (left, blue shirt) and Mrs. Kaimbay, CCET-SL Director and local principal, right, watch as a young volunteer prepares her seedling bag.

It’s the rainy season now in Sierra Leone and planting time.  Rotifunk is busy planting tree seedlings to raise in their nursery for trees of economic value. 

Thanks to cell phone pictures and Facebook, we can all now see the nursery taking shape and seedlings growing.

The tree nursery is a project of Rotifunk’s home grown nonprofit organization, the Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation.  CCET-SL’s aim is to empower their community in development with projects like the tree nursery.  With these projects, they hope to transform lives of the average person in Bumpeh Chiefdom.

I shouldn’t say they hope to transform lives.  They plan to transform lives. With simple, concrete projects like the tree nursery that will have clear payback, this isn’t a leap of faith.  Next year, the trees will be ready for people to plant in their own gardens and farms to improve their family’s diet and gain income by selling their surplus.   Citrus, coconut and oil palm trees, as well as teak trees for future lumber sale.

Bumpeh Chiefdom is a rural area rich in agriculture.  So, economic development here starts with agriculture projects. To read the whole story about the Economic Tree Nursery,  click here to see an earlier post.  Sherbro Foundation has supported the nursery project with money to buy farm tools and young oil palm seedlings bred for early fruiting.

Filling polythene bags with soil that will allow seedling to form deep roots. This looks like rich silty soil from the Bumpeh River floodplain.

Filling polythene bags with soil that will allow seedling to form deep roots. This looks like rich silty soil from the Bumpeh River floodplain.

Rotifunk community gets involved with preparing the bags to hold seedlings.

Rotifunk community gets involved with preparing the bags to hold seedlings.

Seedlings will be nursed in the nursery, watered and protected from hot tropical sun in the dry season til ready to plant next year.

Seedlings will be nursed in the nursery, watered and protected from the dry season’s hot tropical sun til ready to plant next year.  Families across Bumpeh Chiefdom are eligible to get trees at a token cost.

CCET-SL volunteers and local teachers Osmun Kamara and Phillip Komoh.

CCET-SL volunteers and local teachers Osmun Kamara and Phillip Komoh.  I’d guess these are coconut seedlings.

Breaking the barrier of illiteracy

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Junior Secondary School 3 students (JSS3 or 9th grade in the U. S.) across Sierra Leone last week completed the BECE exam.  The Basic Education Certificate Examination is a standardized exam administered throughout West Africa by the West African Examination Council to certify students are ready to progress to senior high school.

This is a quiet milestone. But progressing to high school should be celebrated as a big deal for a country where 56% of adults over the age of 15 years in 2011 have never attended formal school. (World Bank data) This number seemed high to me.  But if you stop to think, it’s again that group of young adults whose educations were interrupted by the war and its aftermath.

JSS3 students from four Rotifunk secondary schools are glad the rigorous BECE exam is over.  Twenty two subjects are offered, and students expected to test in 10-13 subjects that take 2 to 2 ½ hours each.  That means 5-6 days of testing for each student.

To pass the BECE, students must pass at least six subjects, including English and Math.  Sierra Leone pass rates last year were only 50% of test takers in Language Arts and 57% in Math; it’s not an easy exam.  Less than half the students taking the BECE in 2012 in the Southern Province where Rotifunk sits passed the overall exam.

Four Rotifunk secondary schools are taking the exam:  Walter Schutz Memorial Secondary School (where I taught many years ago), Prosperity Girls High School, Ahmadiyya Islamic School and Rotifunk’s Christian academy.

Student debaters at Walter Schutz Secondary School and their teacher after completing a debate.

Student debaters at Walter Schutz Secondary School and their teacher after completing a debate.

Prosperity Girls High School was the stand-out in 2012, not only in Rotifunk, but in Moyamba District (one of 12 administrative districts in the country). 100% of PGHS girls taking the BECE exam passed. This is significant given the area’s first all-girls secondary school had only been open three years when students first sat for the BECE last year.  It was the first time each individual girl took the exam, and the first time the school sent students to sit for the exam.  It was also the first year JSS3 – or 9th grade – had been offered at this new school.

Prosperity Girls High School was recognized by the Ministry of Education for their exceptional results.  It was noted their results could be compared with schools in the district open for a hundred years. Their net results were seen as second in the district, given their actual scores and smaller number of students.

So, how did PGHS pull this off?  It starts with an excellent principal and excellent teachers who are capable in their respective subjects and highly committed to their students.  But their secret ingredient is holding what Principal Kaimbay calls a camp – a month long study camp.

JSS3 students hunker down at the school and live there dormitory style all week while the teachers conduct comprehensive reviews of the whole curriculum.  Principal Kaimbay sleeps at the school with them, getting them up at 5:00 AM to begin an early study period before review classes start at 8:00 AM.  They have afternoon breaks for sports and rest, and evening review classes begin again after dinner til about 10 PM.  They can go home for the weekend, and return to begin the condensed study program again on Monday – for a whole month.

This approach delivered results.  Every girl passed in 2012, allowing PGHS to open their first senior high class (10th grade) for the current 2013 academic year.  Mrs. Kaimbay attributes their success to the comprehensive review and keeping the students focused.  We make sure we review every subject and the full curriculum before the exam, she said.  We try to verify knowledge and assist each student.  We provide the  focus and discipline for studying that they would not be able to get if they were studying at home.

Twenty eight JSS3 students from PGHS sat for the BECE this year.  So, it requires not only discipline for the students, but a huge commitment by the teachers and principal. As in countries everywhere, the teachers and principal are the heroes of this story.

I asked PGHS teacher Mr. Sonnah how it was going a couple weeks ago.  Great, he said.  They did a better job preparing the study camp this second time around, so he expects to see results on par with last year. 

Sherbro Foundation knows  JSS3 students from all Rotifunk’s secondary schools have worked hard to be ready for the BECE.  We wish them all the best as they await their results.

Growing the ranks of students ready for senior high is essential for this rural community – and for the country – to continue their development journey and move beyond poverty.  There will no doubt be barriers to the students completing senior high and then joining the workforce.  But academic readiness should not be one of them.  It should be an enabler.   Fortunately, in Rotifunk students are being given a good start. 

You can help.   One barrier Sherbro Foundation is helping to remove is the burden of school fees for rural families unable to pay them.  Consider contributing to the Girls Scholarship Fund that awards school fee scholarships to girls in all four Rotifunk secondary schools.   $22 USD pays fees for one senior high girl to attend school for the year.  $18 USD covers annual school fees for one junior high girl.   You can find an on-line donation button in the right hand column of the website.

West African Peace Corps?

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As a former Peace Corps Volunteer, this article caught my eye.  ECOWAS, the Economic Community of West African States, is sending forty volunteers from their states to serve in education and health care in Sierra Leone.  Twenty have arrived to serve as French and Science teachers in eleven of the country’s upcountry districts, with twenty doctors and intensive care nurses to follow.

I think of ECOWAS as akin to the European Union.  The purpose given for this Volunteer group: “ECOWAS Volunteers are young men and women professionals from the 15 Member States, who contribute to regional development efforts and the consolidation of peace and reconstruction in crisis affected-communities of the region.”

They will work under “at times, difficult conditions” and help “to strengthen the capacities of local organizations, establishing and supporting partnerships between communities.”

Sounds like something a U. S. Peace Corps Volunteer can identify with.

I applaud their effort.  Another sign that peace and stability have taken hold in West Africa with countries sending volunteers to promote peace and development  in their fellow states.

I would say to these volunteers, you’re likely to get more out your experience there than you feel you are able to give.  Experiences that will serve you well for the rest of your life.  Most U. S. Peace Corps Volunteers fondly say this of their Peace Corps service.  Enjoy it!

Read the full article here: http://awoko.org/2013/06/26/sierra-leone-20-ecowas-volunteers-to-serve-in-sierra-leone/

Obama’s Bumpeh Chiefdom fans

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Obama may not be visiting Sierra Leone this week, but he has fans in Bumpeh Chiefdom.  You don’t need to look far to see people proudly showing their support for Obama.

Mr. Bendu, left, of Moyeamoh village, proudly wears his Obama hat in front the Obama picture on his front porch. (He's holding the chicken I've been presented with.)

Mr. Bendu, left, of Moyeamoh village, proudly wears his Obama hat in front the Obama picture he keeps on his front porch. (He’s holding the chicken Arlene’s been presented with.)

Mr. Bendu, Moyeahmoh village, displays his Obama watch.

Mr. Bendu, Moyeahmoh village, displays his Obama watch.

Woman Sampa dancer in Rotifunk wears her Obama shirt.

Woman Sampa dancer in Rotifunk wears her Obama shirt.

Registering births – a basic human right

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I’ve always thought of having a birth certificate in the U. S. as a legal right of U. S. citizenship.  But I never stopped to think of it as a basic human right.  Maybe that’s because we’ve always had birth certificates here.  I frankly never thought much of it because I never had to experience what it’s like to have to prove who you are.

Mr. Sonnah described birth certificates in Sierra Leone as being a basic human right – that your birth is documented and you as a person are legitimized.  Simple and straightforward – but not easy in today’s rural Sierra Leone.

Mr. Sonnah, teacher and volunteer organizer at Rotifunk’s Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation (CCET), said birth and death registration is required by law today in Sierra Leone, but the majority of rural communities either do not understand this or do not have the means to do it.

Sixty percent of Sierra Leone’s population lives in rural areas with little to no national government presence.  Traditional paramount chief rulers are the primary – and often the only – means of ensuring basic law and order, and delivering the fundamental systems of organized societies.  Systems like registering births and deaths.

So CCET is embarking on a project to organize a grass roots system to register births and deaths on a monthly level down to the smallest villages in Bumpeh Chiefdom.  With 208 villages, many of them remote with barely drivable roads (in good weather) and little or no public transportation, this is no small task. 

The birth and death registration project is the brain child of Bumpeh Chiefdom Paramount Chief Charles Caulker.  When Chief Caulker asked if Sherbro Foundation could help with sponsoring an initial training workshop, I asked him to explain why this project is important and how it fit within the foundation’s mission of furthering rural development.  I could intuitively make the connection, but wanted his perspective.

Paramount Chief Caulker in village meeting with his official staff bearer & horn blower.

Paramount Chief Caulker in village meeting with his official staff bearer & horn blower.

Arlene, he said, NGO’s (non-governmental organizations) and UN groups like UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Fund) come to Sierra Leone all the time to do studies and planning for their aid programs.  We can’t accurately tell them about our population demographics, especially for children and children under the age of five – one their major program target groups.  They then can’t do accurate forecasts and plan program budgets.  They’re spending money to provide for children born in the past, and we can’t accurately tell them how many we have and where they are today.

Sierra Leone is a country where 60% of its population is under the age of 24 years of age.  The Infant Mortality Rate is still is 74.95 of 1000 live births – 11th highest of 224 countries worldwide.  (From CIA World Factbook, Sierra Leone – last updated 2013) So, accurately counting children and planning program services for children is indeed an important part of rural development.

There are more immediate and practical reasons why the people of Bumpeh Chiefdom need a birth registration system.  Without a birth certificate, you cannot gain admission to schools and get the free health services the government provides. You must prove you are a Sierra Leone citizen. Nor can you cannot get a passport or contest election and run for local office. 

I asked Mr. Sonnah what people do today without birth certificates. They are penalized for not having one when they need it, he said, by paying a fine of Le 5000 (about $1.25USD). Then they are given one.

Proving your birth and place of birth is more fundamental to us, Mr. Sonnah said.  Beyond proving you are a Sierra Leone citizen, people want to claim their home village.  They want to claim the cultural set (tribal group or ethnicity) they belong to.  These are social rights that are important to us.

When we consistently give people their rights to citizenship, Mr. Sonnah said, then we can ask them to perform the responsibilities of citizens.  Things like paying taxes and voting, both institutions still in the early formative stages in Sierra Leone.

Chief Caulker was frustrated with the lack of accurate population data and people in his own chiefdom missing their personal documentation.  So he’s decided to organize a model program to register births and deaths in his own chiefdom.

Bumpeh Chiefdom is divided into thirteen sections, each with a Section Chief and local leaders.  Like the paramount chief, section chiefs are elected from traditional ruling families.  They rule for life and are responsible for the welfare of the villages in their section.  They periodically meet with Chief Caulker and other chiefdom leaders in a Chiefdom Council to discuss issues that affect them and their people.

Bumpeh Chiefdom Council meeting - town hall style.

Bumpeh Chiefdom Council meeting – town hall style.

This cascading system of traditional leaders will be used for the birth and death registration system.  Villages will have a representative trained to keep a ledger recording births and deaths as they occur and bring them to their Section Chief.  Monthly, sections will report their data to the chiefdom level to compile overall stats.

It’s a simple manual system for now.  But it’s the strong organization of traditional chiefdom leaders used to working together in a collaborative process that will make it work.  That and the inclusiveness and steady hand Chief Caulker brings to managing chiefdom programs.

An old tradition will also be reinstated with the birth registration system.  The Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation will ensure each child born has a tree planted in their home village to recognize their birth.  Read more about CCET’s Economic Tree Nursery project and how this will be used to provide birth trees here.

The Sherbro Foundation is pleased to be sponsoring costs for an initial workshop where village representatives will be trained on registering births and deaths.

Growing trees with economic value

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Let’s talk about the another part of the Sherbro Foundation’s work – helping to spur economic development in a rural community.

On my last two trips to Sierra Leone an idea was percolating in my brain that finally crystalized.  I recognized I wanted to do something beyond the cycle of donations for traditional nonprofit work supporting education, health, community services and the like.  Don’t get me wrong.  These are important and much needed.  These are a lot of what Sherbro Foundation is doing, too.

But I also wanted to do something else.  Something more.

The more is giving the chiefdom a boost in economic development, and their main economic livelihood is agriculture.  This chiefdom is blessed with fertile land for agriculture and rivers with which to irrigate.  It is lacking the means for most people to develop and expand beyond subsistence agriculture, or to further develop agriculture as a business.

Doing more is helping people expand and diversify their family farm crops, increasing their own food security and allowing them to sell a little excess for much needed cash.

Doing more is also helping spur small farming business that can expand, and in doing so, create paid jobs where none now exist. Getting jobs with regular paid wages can help people join the “formal economy” where they can then pay their own children’s school fees and buy their own mosquito nets.

I was astounded when Bumpeh Chiefdom Paramount Chief Caulker told me what typical cash incomes are in many small villages.  It may be as small as 50,000 Leones/year.  This is little more than $10 USD.  $10 per year, that is.  This is the bottom of the subsistence scale, an informal economy of barter.  You locally trade or sell small amounts of what you grow.  Otherwise, you live off the land, and the fish in the rivers.  Or small game you may be able to hunt.  Bush beef we called it.  You may be able to raise a few goats and chickens.

Tending a vegetable garden. Day care on your back.

Tending a vegetable garden. Day care on your back.

The most disadvantaged are young adults, eighteen and up, ready to start out on the own.  Also women divorced or separated from husbands, left to fend for themselves and their children.  The families of these groups literally do not have any excess money to loan them to start their farms and vegetable gardens.  With no money for tools, seed, and fertilizer, these groups are stuck. Stuck in extreme poverty.

The Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation, Rotifunk’s all-volunteer group for community development is beginning to tackle this area by starting a tree nursery for trees of economic value.

The idea came up one day on my last trip when we needed to escape the heat of a tropical afternoon in the dry season.  Come on, said Chief Caulker, let’s go pick grapefruits.  We took chairs beyond his house and down a hill to an old citrus orchard started by his father fifty years ago.  I didn’t know citrus trees live 50+ years; maybe the non-hybridized kind.

Boys catch grapefruits being picked.

Boys catch grapefruits being picked in mature fruit orchard.

Picking fruit meant sending boys to shinny up a tree in their bare feet to drop grapefruits down to other waiting kids.  They hold out gunny sacks to break the fall of fruits and not squash them.  Then we divvy up the fruit so everyone gets some.  We sent someone to find bread and made “sandwiches” for the kids with groundnut paste – roasted peanuts you grind up with an empty bottle on a board.

We were enjoying the grapefruits and Chief Caulker reminisced about how he had had “his tree,” his birth tree, and how this is no longer being done.  Probably another casualty lost to the war. Your Tree is where your umbilical cord is planted after your birth together with a tree seedling.  It grows as you grow, and it’s Your Tree.  An old custom in many parts of Africa.

A charming and practical custom, I agreed.  We need more trees planted in this country.  I see fire wood being cut left and right.  How are trees being replanted?

This led to a conversation about how we should start planting trees and get the new community based organization – the Center for Community Empowerment and Transformation, still an idea, but at least that day drafted on paper – to start this.

Four months later, as I write this, CCET volunteers are planting the Economic Tree Nursery.  The rainy season has started, and it’s time to plant trees.

CCET has started with fruit trees they are germinating from seed and growing themselves to seedlings.  Orange, grapefruit, lemon (we call lime) and mango.

CCET will transplant seedlings to small polythene bags and nurse them til next season, when local people can buy them at a small nominal cost for their farm or garden. Mr. Sonnah, agriculture teacher and CCET volunteer explained, people take things more seriously when they have to pay something for them.  Same thing at home, I said.  These small fees will go back to purchase materials to start new seedlings each year.

Mr. Sonnah said getting fruit trees will improve a family’s food security, giving them another food source and diversifying their diet.  Fruit trees are typically planted near rivers and streams, helping keep them watered.  As trees mature, they then protect the water catchment area. Trees are like sponges, taking up water, and their roots prevent run-off and erosion in the heavy tropical rains.  These water filled trees then help keep streams from easily drying up in the dry season.  People will need chiefdom permission to cut down economic trees and pay a small fee, as well as replant the tree.  This is to discourage trees being cut for firewood.  Acacia, a fast growing “weed tree” can be used for fire wood.

Village woman extracting oil from palm fruits in her canoe.

Village woman extracting oil from palm fruits in her canoe.

CCET is also starting to nurse oil palm seedlings they bought from Njala University’s agriculture school.  Oil palms are native to Sierra Leone, and the oil from the palm fruits is a mainstay of the local diet.  Palm oil is increasingly used globally for a variety of applications, and is a good cash crop.  The Njala seedlings are a new variety that will produce faster,  fruiting in about four years.

Nine hundred teak seedlings from another source have also been added to CCET’s tree nursery.  These need special care with careful pruning and cultivation as young seedlings.  Next rainy season they’ll be bigger and stronger, and ready to be sold and transplanted again for future lumber harvesting.

CCET will organize workshops and 1:1 training on how to plant and care for all the trees that will be sold.  With 60% of the country’s population under 24 years of age, these are skills that were lost in the war years and now needed for young adults and women needing to become farmers.

The custom of children getting “their tree” will start again, as well.  CCET will ensure each child has a tree planted at birth.  In this way, you will also be able to tell how many children were recently born in a village by counting the number of new trees.

This project is a good example of how a few people can make a big difference when they work together and just get going on a practical first step.

Many benefits follow this project: economic development, food security, environmental protection, protecting cultural traditions, empowering youth and women as farmers.

Sherbro Foundation is glad to have contributed the funding to buy farm tools for the tree nursery and the oil palm seedlings.