Not far from where the Nyantang Dundula River slips by the village of Dasilami in Gambia, there rises a stand of giant baobab trees. Branches bristle from the tops of their stout trunks and beneath the canopy, pools of shade cool the air and ground. The houses of one of the largest clans in Dasilami once stood here in the stillness of this glade. But now, they cluster near a sun-scorched road, their owners having traded the comforts of the baobabs for the convenience of being close to a major transportation route.
Gambians have a saying about their baobab trees: "If you want to lean, make sure you lean on something strong to avoid being pushed down." It's a bit of wisdom that informs their approach to hard times, too, even as they leave the baobabs behind. What it means is that with some support, people can help themselves overcome hardships.
That's the idea behind a $65,000 grant Oxfam America has provided to help people in 51 villages—including Dasilami—in Gambia's North Bank Division. Here, food shortages are a constant threat as people struggle to manage the delicate balance between their needs and what the environment can provide. Will there be enough rain to allow crops to grow? Will locusts devour whatever villagers manage to coax from their fields?
A simple solution promoted by Oxfam's local partner, Agency for the Development of Women and Children, or ADWAC, takes the edge off those questions: If villagers had a way to save some of their food and seeds at the end of each harvest, they could have a reserve to fall back on during times of shortage. The trick was to get started.
ADWAC's plan called for building and stocking four cereal "banks"—tidy white structures the size of small houses which can hold up to 30 metric tons of cereals—located at strategic points around the communities. Villagers then formed committees to manage the stored supplies. Those who borrow from the storehouse during a food shortage are obliged to repay the loan and tack on a little extra, too, so that the project can grow.
Now, if drought should shrivel their crops or pests consume them, villagers can turn to that bank of grain, avoiding the need to eke what they can—as the woodcutters in Janack do—from an overstrained environment. The bank will help them weather tough times.
Inside the Dasilami storehouse one recent day, the sweetness of harvested grains fills the hot dry air. Heavy sacks—they weigh just under 200 pounds—stuffed with corn and millet are stacked nearly to the ceiling. Outside, in the shade of a tree laden with mangoes, Nyima Filly Fofana, a mother of nine children and an organizer for one of the cereal bank management committees, talks about what it was like one year recently when both locusts and drought hit the area.
"We experienced a very bitter time," she says. "The family was hungry." In times of food shortages, Fofana's family manages by selling the salt she harvests from mud flats near her home and by eating whatever vegetables they can grow in their garden. But if such trouble should strike again, this time Dasilami has the seeds of a solution—one that can now spread to other villages, too.
"Our worries will be temporarily solved," says Fofana, clapping her hands at the thought of the white building gleaming there in the sun, stocked with grain. "We'll have food. Therefore our families will not cry. Our stomachs will no longer go empty."
]]>In a dusty yard under the shade of a mango tree, Abdulie Camara holds out his hands for a visitor to feel. His palms are as tough as leather. He has been cutting trees—countless numbers of them—to sell their wood for cash so he can help feed some of the dozens of people with whom he now shares his mudbrick house.
His neighbors in the Gambian village of Janack are chopping down the forest, too, in an effort to provide not only for their families, but for the refugees who have settled among them. They are from the Casamance region of Senegal.
A push to gain independence for the region, which has pitted the separatist group known as the Movement of Democratic Forces of the Casamance against the government of Senegal, has fueled more than 20 years of fighting. The violence has forced at least 60,000 people from their homes. An estimated 7,000 of them have streamed across the border to seek safety on Gambian soil, heightening the pressure on an already strained land.
As Camara, and residents of other border villages, have struggled with the crush of that refugee flow, Oxfam America and its local partners have been providing emergency assistance designed to help villagers cope. For them—and the land around them—the consequences of the Casamance conflict have been severe.
The tree-cutting deeply worries some environmentalists.
"In 10 to 20 years, all of Gambia will be a desert," said Marcel Badji, marveling at the wood, split and piled, in the yards around Janack. "People are cutting trees for survival. Huge trees are going down."
Badji is the director of St. Joseph's Family Farms center, a local Gambian organization and Oxfam America partner. His words give voice to a grave reality: Poverty is putting intense pressure on the environment here.
Camara leads a visitor into his small mudbrick house. Forty-six people sleep here, sharing beds and straw mats unfurled on the dirt floor. Many of the refugees who have sought safety in Gambia are related to their hosts. Cousins and nephews are among the people Camara is sheltering.
"It's very difficult to handle such a large number of people," Camara says. "Food is number one." As he speaks, a ruckus breaks out in a kitchen hut at one end of the hard-packed yard. A pair of sheep have nudged their way in and are rooting around for something to eat. Alert family members shoo them out and fasten the door.
A farmer, Camara grows millet, rice, peanuts, and corn. But because of increased pressure on the land, it has lost some of its fertility and his harvests have shrunk. The money he would have used for fertilizer to enrich the soil has been spent helping to support the Casamance refugees.
"It's part of the culture. You assist people who need your help," says Badji. "And these people are in need."
In searching for answers to these problems of poverty, Oxfam and its partners are focusing on ideas that will help people exert control over their circumstances. When villagers have the means—training, resources, know-how—to solve their own troubles, those tools become the basis for lasting solutions.
That's the hope for four bright blue hand pumps that now cap wells in some of the border villages. They are part of a $45,000 grant Oxfam provided to Concern Universal, an international partner that has been addressing the needs of refugees and their hosts.
In the village of Oupat, a short distance from Janack and a stone's throw from the Casamance line, Bakary Sonko and Gibril Sonko worked together on a recent afternoon to spin the handle on one of the pumps. After 40 seconds of cranking, they had filled a four-gallon bucket with fresh water. Bees buzz about the stream as it sputters out of the faucet. Next to the pump sits a large metal barrel hooked to a hose—key components of Oupat's brick-making enterprise. With water readily available, new mudbrick houses?homes for the refugees'are on the rise nearby.
"The pumps can be easily maintained by the communities without big fees," explains Zanira Paralta, an Oxfam humanitarian response officer. "It's a technology Concern Universal has been implementing for five or six years. We realized it could be a good way to provide water at low cost."
Inside the blue casings, the pump mechanism is simple: it looks like a bicycle wheel that spins with the help of a rope affixed with tiny washers that pull up the water. The rope, made from nylon, can be replaced easily when it breaks. To show how simple it is to reach the parts that need fixing, Ousman Jammeh, a technician for Concern Universal, untwists a plastic cap at the top of the pump and removes the plastic tubing through which the rope runs.
Nearby, another well signals the importance of Oupat's new hand pumps. This well, dug in 1983, is dry. A tangle of skinny branches covers its opening. Before Concern Universal installed the new wells and pumps, people had to trek to Nyambolo, the neighboring village, for their water.
Working with other local groups, Concern Universal has built about 150 of these wells using manually operated equipment—simpler technology means fewer breakdowns—to bore the holes. And it has experimented with a variety of materials, available locally such as wood and aluminum, in constructing parts for the pumps.
Niall O'Connor, director of Concern Universal, explains that a similar pump is used in Nicaragua and that Concern made modifications so that it could be used here.
"The whole idea is to be affordable and sustainable," he says.
]]>Having completed a training program with the environmental and human rights organization WACAM, partly funded by Oxfam America, Ayensu said he could tell what had happened: "WACAM has taught me how to identify a polluted stream," he said. Ayensu then went to alert others in Teberebie that there was a cyanide spill in the streams that supply water and fish for him and about 100 families that live along them.
Ayensu's colleague Emilia Amoateng, leader of the Concerned Farmers' Association of Teberebie, immediately started an investigation. Knowing that cyanide is used to separate gold from ore in the mining projects surrounding Teberebie, she centered her investigation on the polluted streams near the south gate of Gold Fields Ghana mining company, and behind the waste piles of AngloGold Ashanti Iduapriem Mines. However Gold Fields has a drain from its tailings dam (a waste storage area) that runs into the stream. She also found that BARBEX Technical Services, a chemical supply company to the various mines in the area, has also constructed a drain from its warehouse into the stream. An accidental cyanide spill from either of these sources would therefore enter the streams quite easily. Recent heavy rains increased the likelihood that water overflowing from these sites would carry any spilled chemicals into the waters.
Moses Ayuba, the district program officer for Ghana's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said water tests had shown extremely high levels of acidity, but that he was unable to identify the cause of the acid in the river. He said that further testing on fish and water should help identify the source of the pollution.
Daniel Owusu-Koranteng, the director of WACAM, said that the pollution represented a serious public health problem. "Some people who mistakenly went swimming in the river had their skin peeled off," he said. "Those who drank the polluted water and ate some of the fish are having serious stomach problems. We have helped seven of them get medical attention."
Owusu-Koranteng went on to say that the mining and chemical supply companies have been reluctant to take responsibility for the pollution. "The mining companies and EPA initially tried to push the blame on 'galamsey' [small-scale mining] activities and later shifted the blame to chemical fishing." He went on to say that chemical fishing is unusual in this area, and in any case would never be done during the rainy season when the rivers are high. He also said that people living near the Barbex Technical Services had been previously warned by the company not to drink from the river, and were permitted to take tap water from the company.
Villagers in Teberebie are now calling on the EPA to help them defend their right to live in a clean environment, and are planning a demonstration to bring media attention to this incident.
]]>"This award is dedicated to the poor mining communities," said Kwarteng. "Their struggle has been recognized. I hope this will encourage people to continue the fight against irresponsible mining."
Kwarteng has served as an advisor to Oxfam America's partners in Ghana that are working to help communities affected by mining pollution and other social problems.
Kwarteng's article described the problems of acid mine drainage, which pollutes rivers and streams with acid leaching from rocks exposed in mining. He wrote about a report from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on an environmental impact assessment for the proposed mine run by the Newmont Mining Corporation of Denver.
Kwarteng gained access to the report after a petition was filed under the US' Freedom of Information Act. When the EPA report became available to the public, it revealed that the testing carried out by Newmont on the potential of acid mine drainage was inadequate. His article was published in the Daily Graphic, the newspaper with the largest circulation in Ghana.
The EPA report also noted that the amount of cyanide that would be allowed in water discharged and held in waste holding areas would be above acceptable standards. Kwarteng's article quoted the EPA report: "Cyanide will be discharged into the tailings facility at 1,000 times the aquatic life water quality standard and 100 times the drinking water standard, thereby setting up for future water quality problems."
Press articles critical of the mining industry in Ghana are unusual. Kwarteng said that access to technical data made his award-wining story particularly strong. "Most of the mining companies here have a way of controlling information, but in this case I got some primary data," he said. "These are facts that could not be disputed."
Kwarteng has also been threatened with lawsuits by mining companies when he published stories about controversial subjects. "Mr. Kwarteng has made great sacrifices to report on many critical mining community issues such as military and police brutalities in mining communities, cyanide spillages, forced evictions of mining communities, and environmental problems," said Daniel Owusu-Koranteng, director of WACAM, an environmental and human rights organization in Ghana that works in partnership with Oxfam America.
]]>She was also furious. "This should not happen to us," she said later, referring to the residents of her village of Teberebie, which had been relocated to accommodate a new mining operation in the area. "What did we do wrong?"
Mr. Baidoo had been walking away from a confrontation between farmers and a military force when he was wounded. The protest arose after the military began blocking a road the farmers used to travel to their fields where they grow cocoa and palm trees, yams, cassava, and other fruits and vegetables. Having recently been denied this route through the mine property, and tired of the alternative—a longer, 12-mile round trip on foot—the entire town turned out in February 2006 to demand access to the road. Baidoo and one other man were shot, and several people were beaten.
Amoateng immediately called WACAM, the environmental and human rights organization partly funded by Oxfam that had trained her and others in the community. "I reported that Anthony had been shot, and was lying in his own blood," she said. After WACAM's director Daniel Owusu-Koranteng called the head of the AngloGold Ashanti mine company, Baidoo got the medical care he needed to survive at the company's expense. After recovering for eight months in the hospital he is now disabled.
Teberebie is a farming community in the Wassa West District of Ghana's Western Region. The community was resettled in 1991 to make room for the AngloGold Ashanti, Iduapriem Mine, which is now producing over 300,000 ounces of gold per year. It is just one of many scenes of violence over the last several years, as Ghana has thrown open its doors to foreign companies and relaxed its rules on investment to encourage more mining. The shootings in Teberebie were just two of 15 reported by the BBC in 2005 and 2006.
Amoateng is now a leader of the Concerned Farmers' Association of Teberebie, which consists of 35 farmers who have worked with WACAM to learn about their human rights under Ghana's constitution and Minerals and Mining Act. She is leading this group in a legal case against AngloGold, alleging non-payment of compensation for their lost farms, which are now buried under piles of waste rock.
Amoateng, 30, said she is now more aware of how the government and mining companies in the area are violating the rights of people in her community—and what to do about it. "Because of WACAM, I now know where to go and who to contact in case of any problem in the community," she said. Her recent activities have included leading a march to the nearby town of Tarkwa, where radio, television, and newspaper journalists interviewed her about the situation facing farmers in Teberebie.
In Ghana, as in many other countries in Africa and other parts of the world, women do not usually lead political struggles. Speaking out publicly is simply out of the question for most women in communities affected by mining in Ghana. Men are normally perceived as the voices of the community. But with the right training and personal ambition, women like Amoateng are showing they are strong leaders.
To more effectively represent her community, Amoateng is presently studying to finish high school and prepare for university. She aspires to be a lawyer and an advocate for women and children.
Her concerns center on basic justice for Teberebie. "The 1992 constitution and the Minerals and Mining Act are my closest friends now," Amoateng said. "I don't want the mining company to cheat my community. And I know my rights as a citizen living in a mining community."
Amoateng's work is a good example of how WACAM uses education as a tool to empower mining communities in their struggle to improve their living conditions. Her training with WACAM has strengthened her community as well as her own ability to represent her neighbors. "This has made me very powerful in the sight of both the mining company, and the men in my community," she said. "I am proud of myself."
Jerry Mensah-Pah is a radio and newspaper journalist based in Tarkwa, Ghana, and has been covering human rights violations related to communities affected by mining for four years. He works for WACAM in the Western Region of Ghana as its assistant programs officer.
]]>In 1996 he and about 25,000 others from several villages were informed they were being evicted from their farms in Ghana's western rain forests to make room for a gold mine run by Gold Fields Ghana, Ltd. "I was not happy," Pelpuo said. "But at the end of the day I had to accept it because the government gave the land to the company. They are not treating us fairly, giving the land to the company without informing the community members."
Since the government of Ghana retains the rights to the minerals under his land, there was not much a farmer like Pelpuo could do—or so he thought. He, along with others from several villages being moved to a new town called New Atuabo, attended a training program led by Oxfam America's partner WACAM, where they learned about their basic rights to own property. They realized that they had a right to negotiate compensation for their lost homes and lands. "Initially we had no knowledge, and we had to learn that what the company was doing was not right," Pelpuo said.
Gold Fields and government representatives did negotiate with community representatives, but the talks became difficult. One community representative was intimidated and eventually arrested for allegedly insulting representatives of the military and local chiefs supporting the mine's offer, according to Daniel Owusu-Koranteng, Executive Director of WACAM. After convincing him to publicly apologize to the chief, the company and its allies then got 95 percent of the relocated families to go along with the deal.
However, Pulpuo and about 125 others refused to accept the compensation offer, and took action themselves late in 1996. With the help of WACAM and the legal aid organization CEPIL, they began negotiating with Gold Fields, a company with mining operations in four countries that last year made a $69 million net profit with over 700,000 ounces of gold from their Ghana mine alone.
At the heart of the disagreement between the company and the group of farmers, which became known as the Lawyer's Group, was the so called "value for value" calculation used by the company to determine what size concrete house would replace existing homes, many made of mud with thatch roofs. "I had 12 rooms," said Agnes Ackon, 68, a mother of five and grandmother of 12. "They were going to replace them with six."
"We learned the language of the court, and got paralegal training to understand our rights," Pelpuo said. "When we met with the company we did not entertain any fears, because we knew our rights. And out of this, the company could see what we were saying at first, and we started to get some of the things we need."
While they were negotiating, many of the Lawyer's Group members stayed in their existing homes as the mining activity moved in around them. One group of homes lost all their clean water as mine activity affected nearby streams, and all suffered from loss of income as their fields were converted to mining pits and waste rock dumps. Many were forced to pull their children out of school because they could no longer afford the fees.
The Lawyer's Group and Gold Fields struggled to come to agreement until Agnes Ackon came up with the solution in 2001: "I suggested that the hospital was now too far away since we moved, and we needed a clinic here now," she said. So in exchange for accepting a new house with fewer rooms and some cash, the Lawyer's Group secured a health clinic for New Atuabo.
"We had to sacrifice for it," Pelpuo said. It was particularly generous of the Lawyer's Group members as they had suffered already at the hands of the company and their neighbors, who had treated them as foolish renegades for disputing their compensation. Yet the Lawyer's Group thanked them by negotiating a public benefit the whole town could enjoy. They even got a commitment from the regional health authority to staff and supply the clinic after construction was completed.
Like many real-life stories, there is not yet a happy ending in New Atuabo. Although the town's neat concrete houses with metal roofs are now arranged on straight streets, they mask the problems of unemployment among the displaced farmers, many of whom are illiterate and unable to secure jobs at the mine.
The new housing comes with new costs, as well. As Pelpuo puts it, "Where we used to live we did not have to pay for water, but after resettlement all this cost is now on the community members. We have to pay for water, sanitation, and we have no jobs."
The members of the Lawyer's Group also suffered an insult when the new health clinic was officially commissioned in 2002. At a public ceremony, the health ministry and mine company took full credit for its construction, and failed to recognize that the money used to build it came out of the compensation fund negotiated from the relocated farmers in the Lawyer's Group.
Despite this indignity, the farmers did learn about and stand up for their rights—a real achievement. "There was lots of intimidation" said Owusu-Koranteng of WACAM. "But they persisted, and it led to a better settlement for the entire community."
]]>West Africa has made enormous strides toward democracy in recent years. Amid enduring poverty, vibrant networks of farmers, young people, and human rights activists—men and women alike—have emerged, uniting and mobilizing to confront injustice. With funding, training, and advocacy support from Oxfam, these energetic groups are seeking to improve their lives, to participate in decisions that affect them, to speak out, and to break away from the fate of poverty.
]]>TONUS initiated the credit-led groups in 1997.
Sitting behind his desk, cluttered with papers and files wilting in the heat and humidity of Mali’s August rainy season, Doumbia had gone over the figures a thousand times. He kept coming to the same conclusion, and it was one that made him smile: Despite having to save their own money, Saving for Change works for poor women.
"In the first eight months, the SFC groups had 3,427 members, and the credit microfinance groups had 1,983 members after eight years," he said. By the end of August 2006, the trend had continued: 5,894 Saving for Change members and 2,144 credit group members.
Not only did Saving for Change have more participants, but the groups were performing better. "The number of participants is higher, the repayment rate is higher. There is a lower total of overdue loans," he said. "The voluntary savings are as much as the credit groups have saved in eight years."
Doumbia said he was at first surprised at these results. "When we started SFC I did not think we would see these results by helping women make loans with their own money. The savings rate is a lot lower in the classic, credit-led finance system, and since we began that in 1997 we have not seen much saving. So at the beginning we were worried because we did not have outside capital, and women had to save their own money."
But after just a few weeks, he could see a big difference in the performance of Saving for Change. "One month into it I was impressed," he said. "Since then I have been watching the stats. I held a meeting with the credit-led finance team to show them the results so far. It has now been almost nine months and the savings are almost the same as the credit-led finance system—about 8 million CFA francs (about $14,500) for Saving for Change groups versus 9 million CFA ($16,300) in savings for the credit program after eight years."
Since August of 2006 the trend has continued. By the end of March 2007 the Saving for Change groups savings had jumped to over $186,000, just over five times the amount saved by the credit groups over eight years. Savings for Change groups have twice as much money loaned out and working in the community, and a repayment rate over 99 percent.
The numbers in this case do not lie, and they prove something significant: Poor people can save money. Doumbia says that the higher rate and amount of voluntary savings can be attributed to the organization of the Saving for Change groups, not necessarily the participants’ level of income. To Doumbia, this shows a weakness in the credit-led system: "Their savings are low, not due to lack of money, but because the system does not work as well," he said.
Doumbia says the women make it all possible. "The Savings for Change women are at the center of the program," Doumbia said. "It all starts with them. They mobilize their own savings, pay back their loans, and manage the groups."
| Saving for Change Groups April 2005 - March 2007 | Credit-Led Finance Groups October 1997 - March 2007 | |
|---|---|---|
| Group members | 12,410 | 2,248 |
| Total deposits | $186,432 | $34,431 |
| Outstanding loans | $112,914 | $55,938 |
| Number of overdue loans | 4 | 86 |
| Amount of overdue dept | $280 | $5,206 |
| Repayment rate | 99.75% | 90.70% |
Dalla Sissoko is watching this closely. Sissoko is one of the founders of the TONUS organization in Mali in 1995. This social service agency is now one of Oxfam America's partners in the Saving for Change program in Mali, and Sissoko is a micro-finance expert and head of the women's program at TONUS.
"We say that women are at the center of the Saving for Change program," Sissoko said on a rainy afternoon at the TONUS headquarters outside Bamako. "When we go to a village we have to speak with a chief or council, but after these initial meetings we are in contact only with the women. The women run the bank, keep the books, and run the meetings," she said.
It's no surprise that the women also enjoy the benefits of their Saving for Change group, Sissoko says. "We are seeing women have more money for buying things for the family and paying school fees. And many have extra money to buy things for their daughters when they get married, like a bed, and pots and pans."
Having more money to contribute to the family needs and expenses is a change in the role of women in the family. Men can see the benefits of the program, and their acceptance is important because participation in Saving for Change involves a time commitment from the busiest person in the family. "With Saving for Change women have two hours each week to talk among themselves, and they can have a break," Sissoko says, "They enjoy the company of their friends. It's really important to have this space. More and more, the men are allowing this time, and things are changing slowly. Many of the women are starting to wear better clothes, and the families are eating better. The health of children and their families are improving also, and men appreciate this."
But membership in a Saving for Change group goes beyond money and fellowship. "In most cases women do not get much information or training, but with the Saving for Change program they can get training among themselves," Sissoko says. TONUS trains women in managing their accounts, and in preventing and treating malaria, one of the most serious health threats in Mali.
And as with any organized group of knowledgeable people, Saving for Change group members look beyond their own personal concerns and advocate for ways to improve their community. In this case, groups propose ways to prevent malaria in the entire village. "They eventually start speaking in public," Sissoko says, ?and have opinions people respect."
Being involved in public affairs, and actually speaking your mind in public is simply out of the question for most village women in Mali. This is particularly the case in questions about public health, agriculture, access to water, and other crucial issues facing many villages. "Women are not really involved in development activities, these are dominated by men," Sissoko says. "Women just don?t make any of the decisions about development. They are not consulted and they are not heard. Women do not speak out in public. When they are young they are told that if they speak out they will never get a husband."
Minata Konaré, a 24-year-old mother of three and member of a Savings for Change group says that having the confidence to speak in public is one of the biggest changes for her, and it all started at her group meetings. "I never used to be able to speak in public, but now I can talk in public," Konaré says while passing by a friend's house on her way to work selling food in the village of Guily, near where she lives. "I used to always be at my house, but now I come to the village and talk with the other women, so this is opening things up for me."
The positive changes for women seen by Sissoko and others are being documented in a study carried out by Oxfam in late 2006. It looked at the progress being made in 20 villages in Mali, where researchers got numerous comments from women members of Saving for Change groups as well as their husbands and others in the communities. "Women are earning more money, and their new income enhances their status in their households," one researcher commented. "They are purchasing things they couldn't previously afford, they are contributing more to household expenses, and they report helping their husbands more."
Sissoko says women are creating ways for villages to better store their grains and other crops, eliminate mosquito breeding areas, and promote other positive changes they see helping everyone in the community. "Saving for Change helps women build confidence in their ability to do things," Sissoko says. "The entire village benefits from Saving for Change."
]]>But once they know this they take serious action, learning how to prevent the disease by sleeping under nets treated with insecticide, and filling in puddles and other places where mosquitoes can breed. They take special care to help pregnant women get access to government-sponsored prenatal care, which includes a free mosquito net.
A recent survey of villages where Saving for Change groups have been formed is showing that 75 percent of members understand that mosquitoes transmit malaria, while only half of non-members in the communities know this. Seventy percent of members knew that mosquito nets are an effective way to prevent malaria, compared to only 40 percent of non-members. More than half of members said they slept under a bed net the previous evening, compared to just 30 percent of others in the community. And more than 40 percent of Saving for Change members said they had purchased a bed net since joining a group, evidence that the availability of information about the value of bed nets contributed to changes in behavior.
Overall, malaria killed 22,000 people in Mali in 2005, and ranked third among all causes of death after respiratory infections and diarrheal diseases, according to the World Health Organization's latest figures. The death toll for children is particularly severe. Mali ranks 175 out of 177 countries in the rate of death from all causes of children under five, at 218 per 1,000, and malaria causes about 17 percent of those deaths.
"Malaria is a crucial problem in Mali," says Macky Doucouré, president of the non-governmental group CAEB, one of Oxfam's Saving for Change partners in Mali. "The majority of deaths of pregnant women are due to malaria. More women in Mali die from malaria than they do from AIDS...as many as die in childbirth."
The death toll is heavy, but so is the price to stay alive, as many families struggle to find money to transport sick people to clinics, and buy medication. "Some families have to spend as much as 60 percent of their income on health care," Doucouré said. This is why malaria is an important topic when it comes to community finance programs: nothing will destroy a family's assets like chronic illness.
Once women are organized into Saving for Change groups it is easier for them to work together to educate people in their village about malaria and take steps to prevent it. "It is a really big change for people to understand that there are things they can do in their own villages to prevent malaria," Doucrouré said.
He described one village where women in a Saving for Change group took some extraordinarily active steps. "They decided to create their own committee to help women prevent malaria, and encourage the use of insecticide impregnated mosquito nets at night while people are sleeping. Each night members of the committee would visit homes to make sure women and their children were sleeping under their mosquito nets, and they would even fine women not using the nets 50 CFA or maybe 100 CFA [10 or 20 cents]."
"Creating a committee to prevent and help people treat malaria is a significant innovation for these families and their village, and it was made possible by the Saving for Change group financed by Oxfam—it is something the women created themselves to deal with the problem, it did not come from outside the village."
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