Grant Won by Foxes' NGO Celebrated by Yusto and Rehema

United States Ambassador Alfonso Lenhardt
presents Ambassador's award to Rehema Mgimwa and Yusto Chumi

This week members of the NGO travelled to Dar es Salaam to take part in a ceremony at the United States embassy. The event was hosted by US Ambassador Alfonso Lenhardt, and it was to celebrate the work of various Tanzanian Non-governmental Organizations, such as Foxes' NGO, who would be accepting a grant for various projects. Our organization was accepting a grant for $28,000 to build a new nursery school to be opened in January 2013!

Rehema Mgimwa and Yusto Chumi were there along with management to receive the cheque from the ambassador. Construction has already begun on the project, as currently, roofing is going up.

It was a proud moment for the NGO as Rehema and Yusto were each interviewed by various members of the Tanzanian press, and both spoke eloquently and with pride about what the NGO has accomplished, and what the goals are for the future.

We are happy that Rehema and Yusto got to be a part of this event, and we look forward to future opportunities for members of our NGO to get a chance to speak to the masses about the work being done in Mufindi.

Dismas Makonye Update

Dismas is off to great start on his new life of independence

A couple of months ago Dismas’s family decided he could comehome. He had been living at Igoda Children’s Village since 2010 when his home environment had become abusive, and there was little prospect of success at his home. Even though his mother is a single parent now, she is building herself a new home, and she is excited to have her family back together. Dismas will now be living closer to school, which was one of the benefits he considered when discussing the move. He is doing really well is school, and he is showing great initiative. He finished the semester earlier this year with results that placed him in the top half of his class, but when asked how he felt about the result, he said he was disappointed and wanted to do even better.

He is currently also working at the Children’s Village on projects like our vegetable garden, so that he can put himself through secondary school. He is saving for school supplies, and for next year’s school fees. This year he came to the Children’s Village to collect some of his earnings to pay for new school shoes. He was excited to see actual results from his labour as well, and is ready for this next step starting a new life on his own.

Dismas has said he wants to finish school so he can one day build a good life for himself and his family.

Foxes’ NGO enables students like Dismas to put themselves through school through various projects that the students work on during weekends, or school holidays. If you would like to support one of these projects to enable more children to put themselves through school, please let us know! A little goes a long way… For example, $20 is enough for school fees for one semester!

Owning Their Own Development

Raheli Mkusi (back center) led the children of Igoda Children's Village
in harvesting the maize during a short school holiday this week.

This week, primary school students had a brief holiday from school, and most children spent the week helping their families work their farms. The same was true for children living at Igoda Children's Village, as the guardians here have tried very hard over the years to give the children the opportunity to live the same life as their friends in the surrounding villages.

Even nursery students helped with the harvest.
The maize collected will be used for the nutritious snack
they receive each day at school at the Children's Village

It is estimated that over $1,000 worth of Maize was harvested this week, and the children helped every step of the way. From collecting the maize from the stocks, to removing kernels from the cobs, to sacking all of the maize, the children played an integral part in the collection of the production of their own food. This is the same household work that children in the villages do for their own families during school break, so we are happy that this development worked out for all involved. The maize will be used to feed the children at Igoda Children's Village, and will help feed the children of the nursery school during the day.

Raheli Mkusi led the harvesting project this week, and she is yet another one of our shining members of the NGO. Raheli came to the NGO in 2011 when her husband had left her and her family with a huge unpaid loan taken from a nearby lending agency. Raheli asked for work, and had experience working in vegetable gardens, so she was given the position of head gardener as the responsibilities of the house guardians had become too overwhelming to expect them to also keep up with a garden that had been growing slowly over the years.

In 18 months the garden not only had phenomenal yields of vegetables that fed the Children's Village and was sold to the nearby village, but it had also expanded to 5 acres of vegetables and a 2 acre strawberry patch!

Children preparing the maize for storage. Well over 3000kg
was harvested this year!

Raheli is an extremely hard worker, and she leads by example. She is invested in the positive development of her community, and sees the children as the future leaders of this community. We are proud to be working with people like Raheli who help make the organization the success that it is!

Ambulance Appeal

Some fantastic people are helping to raise funds for an ambulance for our under-serviced rural area. We applaud the efforts of the Alkebulan Ambulance Appeal, and offer some additional information about the project here.

People needing emergency care, currently have to walk sometimes over
half a day to the closest facility, or be transported by bicycle.

Mdabulo Ambulance Project

INTRODUCTION

Mdabulo Health facility is located in Mdabulo Ward, in Mufindi District, Iringa Region, Tanzania. It is surrounded by green tea fields, rain forest, and brown muddy roads. The nearest Hospital to the facility is over 50 kilometers away in the district Capital of Mafinga, and depending on dry season or rainy season travel, a bus ride can take from 4 to 8 hours. Many of the 30,000-40,000 people that live in the area around Mdabulo have never been to Hospital, or have never experienced even some of the basic health care services. A small NGO in the area started by the Fox family who have lived in Mufindi since 1959, is trying to change all of that. Since 2005, Foxes’ Community and Wildlife Conservation Trust (Foxes’ NGO for short) has worked with a holistic approach towards enabling the community to care for all of its orphaned and vulnerable children. The area around Mdabulo has a very high HIV prevalence, in part due to the migrant work brought in through the tea industry, and the heavy transport that comes through the rural area that is less equipped with educational resources to prevent the spread of HIV. The NGO has made improvements at local schools, given services towards direct orphan care such as the completion of a children’s village (orphanage), and has improved health services at local facilities.

PROGRESS THUS FAR

At Mdabulo, a big construction project is underway to complete the area’s first Hospital that will serve the 30,000 – 40,000 people in the area with basic health services such as minor and major surgery, x-ray, dental facilities, and more. There has already been much accomplished at Mdabulo, including the refurbishment of Doctor’s consultancy rooms, a newly constructed pharmacy, and an entire new Maternity wing with pre-natal care equipment, and a labour room, that has encouraged more and more women to have their children at a health facility, instead of at home in the village.

HIV/AIDS

As mentioned already, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has had an enormous impact on this rural community. The disease has spread to so many, and the area has had so few resources to fight back, that community at large has suffered from a vicious cycle of poverty, and the number orphaned and vulnerable children has become overwhelming. Great strides have been made by the community however, in just the past few years, as advancements in access to HIV treatment brought on by the NGO have created a healthier community that is now better equipped to care for its children. Just four years ago, HIV treatment was only available in the district capital, and for many the $9 cost of transport there and back made treatment impossible. Eventually a Care and Treatment Facility was built at Mdabulo allowing for treatment to happen in the village for the first time.

Now there are corners of the community that are still cut off from treatment by the great distances they have to travel, and an outreach program is being conceptualized to extend the care and treatment services to other health facilities in remote areas.

MULTI-PURPOSE VEHICLE

Availability of an ambulance vehicle would put an end to the heroic, but laborious efforts of family and neighbors who try to transport the sick to the far away health facility by bicycle, or by foot. An ambulance would help patients arrive safely at the health facility, eliminating the unfortunate occurrence of patients not making it to the health facility, and literally dying on their way. An ambulance would eliminate the all to frequent occurrence of expecting mothers going into labour and having their child in the road, or in a field, as they were unable to travel fast enough by bicycle or by foot to reach the health facility in time. An ambulance would also encourage the community to use the health facility more often, thus saving lives, and preventing illness. The mere presence of an ambulance in this rural community would have a salubrious influence on the community, and would improve overall health in the area.

In addition to these positive effects, the ambulance would save many lives due to better access to HIV treatment, and therefore the inevitable HIV prevention education that comes with it. The ambulance would be used to transport the Care and Treatment Clinic for HIV’s staff once a month to a remote health dispensary more than 20 kilometers away, thus enabling another 8 villages, or over 15,000 people, better access to HIV treatment. The once a month clinics worked for three and half years at Mdabulo, and in that time, enrollment for the HIV treatment program went from just over 200 patients, to nearly 1,500. Now there are over 2,000 patients enrolled, and the number is constantly growing, as with better access to treatment, the community has banished stigma, and education has spread about this disease, and how it may be controlled, and spared from the lives of the community’s children.

CONCLUSION:

A community will be hard pressed to advance itself when it is not healthy. This must happen in order for life to go on. The presence of an Ambulance at the Mdabulo health facility is a massive step towards a brighter future for this community, and a huge bump in progress towards positive development for this part of Mufindi. With this project completed, lives will be saved, and the people of Mufindi will be better equipped to pull themselves out of poverty.

Home Based Care Kits Delivered

Supplies delivered to Mdabulo CTC by
Foxes' NGO Home Based Care volunteers.

The Home Based Care got a long-awaited boost today from the government of Tanzania. Back in early 2011, the then District Medical Officer pledged to help our home based care volunteers by supping them with kits for first-aid and other treatments. This was to be done once the training was complete. We have waited patiently and supplemented when we could from donations, but unfortunately, few kits have been delivered over the past 2 and a half years.

This week however, a major delivery was made, and this gives us hope that going forward the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare may have a budget to help this underserved community. The 22 Foxes’ NGO Home Based Care Volunteers work in 11 different villages, and they have some major responsibilities including following up on people with HIV who have stopped coming to receive HIV treatment, working with and educating families enrolled in our milk powder project, and coordinating any visits by visiting health professionals. The volunteers also get the word out on a door-to-door basis when a health resource comes to the village.

The kits delivered will help the volunteers give an even better overall health service. Items delivered include: basic medications such as Co-Trimoxazole and paracetamol, anti-biotics, oral rehydration salts, basic first-aid items, and other useful resources. We are happy to get this government contribution, though there is a long way to go to get a consistent contribution to this area from the ministry- even this shipment was transported and delivered from the District Hospital by Foxes’ NGO, as there is clearly underfunding happening that is creating challenges in the supply chain of medical resources.

Foxes’ NGO will continue to do what we can as a small grassroots organization, and donations for this program are vital to keep a valuable health service going. At the same time we will continue to look for more involvement from as many sources as possible.

Congratulations Ezra!

Ezra Mhegele worked as store keeper with Foxes' NGO
 which enabled him to save enough to put himself
 through school

Ezra Mhegele has been working with Foxes' NGO at Igoda Children's Village for almost a year now, and this week he is moving on to University. We are very excited for him, and impressed with his hard work, as he has been able to put himself through school through employment under the NGO, and support from his family from Mkonge village.

Ezra started work with the NGO when he needed an extra $50 to pay for getting his form-6 certificate. He paid that loan off quickly and started saving. He quickly became a valued member of the NGO family, not only as our storekeeper for building supplies, and Children's Village food and needs, but he also started a computer course that members of the NGO and surrounding community attended.

His presence will be missed in Igoda, but we wish him the very best of luck on his studies. He has been selected to join Mwenge University in Moshi, Tanzania, and will be getting his Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Statistics.

He left us all a very sweet message as he left for his travels this week:

Much thanks to Foxes' NGO. For hosting and taking care for my life (Since 28th Nov. 2012 To 8th Sept. 2013) 
I real enjoyed to work with this our big and lovely Family, I got something which is very wonderful in My life History. MUCH THANKS to Jenny Peck, Geoff Knight, Yusto Chumi, Joakina Kinayavene, Adda Mtundulu, christina Mvinge (Mimo), Lusiana Chelulye, Elitha Mponzi, Maria Mtende, Vicky Ndedela, Isaya Mwilla, Happy Lusungu, Grace Vating'a, Rehema Mgimwa, Peraja Lutambi, Christina Kabonge, Janeth Nyaganilwa, Elida Ndone, Charles Mwagala, Upendo Sanga, Sijali Kitalika, Hezron Madege, Rodrick King'ung'alo, Patrick Mduvike, Josphati Ngigwa, Sayuni Mwilla, and all Who have not been Mentioned! MUCH LOVE to Princess, Methew, Godi, James, Shamira, Baraka, Zauda, Marck, Juma, Zacharia, Meshack, Nick, Bonny, Sallome, Love, Furahini, Castory, Melania, Rahabu, Tuke, Twiloo and All others (Antti, Carrita, Yohana, Sonja, Meredith, etc)
I HAVE NOTHING TO PAY BACK MORE THAN unstoppable blessing/uncountable prayers, THANKS FOR EVERY THING (LOVE) THAT U GAVE ME, i have no way out, I HAVE TO LEAVE, I'LL MISS & Love You Forever

Ambitions for a More Sustainable Future

The Igoda Children's Village continues to try to find ways to become self-sustained this week. We had some locally generated income produced through sales from our chicken project.

The project also helps teach the children here the skills that may help them when they one day return to the village. Though funding is still required through private donations to support the running costs such as food and needs for the Children's Village, the leaders continue to look for ways to generate local income so as to lessen the load carried by donations.

Since mid-2008 the bulk of running costs have been funded by donations from Canada through our partners in African Children's Book Box Society. We are forever grateful by the hard work, dedication, and commitment that this volunteer charity has shown to the people of Mufindi!

Mwefu Primary School Kitchen Project

The School Kitchen program at Igoda primary school has been a raving success since its inception by the NGO in February 2009. That year, Igoda jumped from 52^nd position in the district, to 7^th out of 152, and we believe it was due to the introduction of a nutritious local dish called uji that was served each day to all of the children. Many children lived too far from school to go home for lunch, and so had no sustenance during their school days. After the success of this porridge, Igoda started serving an additional full meal during lunch time to serve all of its students a regular healthy diet each day.

Mwefu Primary assembles ahead of the announcement of school kitchen items delivered by Foxes' NGO

After the successful results of Igoda’s program, other schools wanted to start their own programs, and one school in particular- Mwefu primary school- is ready to start this year with a full-meal serve each day. The school has recovered from a terrible storm that knocked down most of the classrooms, and the community has shown a spirited effort of togetherness to contribute to the development of their school. This year the parents started contributing maize from their farms to try to supply the school with enough start-up to have a kitchen program at their school for an entire year. They have now collected enough food to run the program for 12 months- enabling the school to give a full meal to all of their students everyday!

The remaining issue for the program was the challenge of dishes. The school/community didn’t have a budget to buy dishes, so there was a mix of borrowing from the student’s homes, to having several students eat off of one plate, to borrowing the ‘public’ set of dishes are kept at the local government office that are designated for funerals or public events. This challenge had the potential to pause the entire program, so in an effort to show support for the contributions the parents had made to their children’s school, the NGO supplied the school with it’s own set of dishes, pots and pans, cups, and plates, and everything needed for the school to run its program on its own. This was a perfect contribution to the program that will be run by the parents and the school itself.

We can’t thank our supporters enough for enabling us to contribute to these school kitchen programs! With your help these children now have a brighter future ahead of them.

Asanteni sana!

Rehema Mgimwa

Rehema Mgimwa is a very important member of the NGO family. She came to us in 2011 asking for work at the Children’s Village as she had a certificate for child-care from a college in Tanga (in the far away coastal region of Tanzania). She was confident, well-dressed, and management was only slightly worried about how long she would last in the remote environs of Igoda village, where amenities such as electricity, running water, and reliable phone network were not available. She was born and raised in another part of Mufindi district, so things wouldn’t be terribly different, but there is a lot to get used to living in this rural area.

At fist she worked as a House Mother helper at Igoda Children’s Village. The Children’s Village is not built like a compound or one big infrastructure, rather it is built in a manner meant to have the feel of a neighborhood in the village. Each of the six separate homes has a live-in full-time Mother, or guardian who cares for up to 12 children in one house. Each house then has a helper who generally lives nearby in the village and comes each day to help with the responsibilities. Rehema was started as a house-mother helper that rotated between all houses when the regular house helper was taking her day off. She quickly gained the trust of the guardians, and became a full-time helper at one particular house after only a few months. Then, in October of the same year as house number 2 was completely constructed and ready to be opened, Rehema became the head house-mother of the new house.

In June the following year, our first NGO committee was formed, and Rehema was an integral part of the group. When a formalized system of committees and departments was formed at the start of this year, Rehema was named as a member of the Big Committee (or Kamati Kuu) and she is now the strong leader at the Igoda Children’s Village. She has shown great poise and determination taking on several cases at the district level regarding child abuse and neglect, and she has worked with the administrative committee and other leaders in the NGO to make an itemized budget on food and household items at the Children’s Village.

This week she organized a difficult logistical exercise arranging a new income generating scheme the NGO should benefit from later next year. We have purchased food supplies to last well into the following year, and the plan is to sell the items to stores or customers during off season at a reasonable price- but higher than point of purchase for the NGO. The extra food supply will be safely stored in the containers located at the Children’s Village. Rehema organized transport of these goods to arrive in the morning of the 28^th, then she got a lift back to town with the lori, to travel on to a trading town named Makambako. Once there, she purchased items such as shoes and jackets in bulk to be sold at a nearby church seminar in Igoda village. The same day, she returned on the same truck in the evening which was carrying building supplies for our various building projects.

We continue to look at various ways of creating more self-sustainability with the NGO through various income generating projects and ideas. Rehema has brought several ideas forward, and her follow-through has been tremendous. Apart from that she is a fantastic Mother-figure to the young children that live at her home at the Children’s Village. We are so pleased to be working with amazing women such as Rehema!

Rehema with storekeeper/computer teacher Ezra Mhegele

Closing Note: Our organization, and in particular the ‘Kamati Kuu,’ would love to hear any and all ideas on income generation from anyone with an opinion! We welcome anyone to share ideas with us, on how the organization may become an even more sustainable endeavor.

Isaya Mwila

Isaya Mwila pictured here (left) with Dismas
who returned home to his family this year!

In 2009, Isaya Mwila became the first House Father at Igoda Children’s Village. He had leadership experience as a former chairman of Mwaya part of Igoda village, and his wife Vicky had been working with the NGO since its inception.

For over a year he had been attending an Adult English class that was taught at the Igoda Community Hall, and he showed great promise as someone who was looking to create positive development in his own life.

Isaya quickly used those leadership skills as an employee of the NGO, and was given more and more responsibilities. He started managing all the small development projects required at the children’s village like road-maintenance, water fetching, and fence repair.

In 2012, he was voted by his pears to become the chairman of the first committee of leaders within the guardians at Igoda Children’s Village. The committee would be tasked with resolving any conflicts between guardians, or between children and guardians. The committee gave the guardians and children another avenue to vent frustrations or miss-communications, and led to more unity in the center.

This year, the employees of the NGO have come together to form a collection of departments that oversee the various projects that are undertaken. This has led to more local leadership, and more investment in the success of the projects themselves.

Isaya was voted head of the administration department, but was also promoted by his peers to become head of the ‘Big Committee,’ or Kamati Kuu is the committee that is made up of all of the department heads. This committee meets every two weeks to discuss the goals of the NGO in the short-term with an eye on long-term success. Isaya chairs each of these meetings, and his leadership is greatly respected.

Isaya’s rise into a major leadership role within the NGO exemplifies the community’s commitment to working shoulder to shoulder with the NGO through local involvement to reaching our biggest goals. Together, and with leaders like Isaya, the community is getting closer and closer to a full recovery from the devastation of the HIV pandemic.

Maendeleo (development) Update- 'Before'

We are all very excited to have our founder/chairman Geoff Fox back from his trip to England. He has lived in Mufindi since 1959 and has such a generous heart for this area. Anyone who knows him and his work can testify that he is committed to seeing this project reach its fullest potential, and he has daily input on the progress of each project. He could easily relax and sit only as a figure-head leader in this organization, and "let the cards fall where they may" in terms of the devastation the HIV has brought to this community, but instead he invests a tireless effort trying to see success for each of the NGO's projects.

This hands on approach is perhaps most evident in terms of development and building projects. Currently there are six major building projects happening simultaneously under the NGO, with a carpentry school starting in the new year. This week an informal discussion about the plans of finishing all of these projects laid out the schedule of work for the carpenters and mason workers.

Dr. Leena Pasanen is blessing us all by moving to Mufindi later this year, and her house- dubbed 'Mapeme House,' due to the trees that surround the house- is nearly finished.

When the current carpentry team is finished with the ceiling and floor installation at Mapeme House, they will move to our Mdabulo Hospital Project where a refurbishment is happening. Several in-patient wards are being refurbished as we speak that will allow the facility to gain more in-patient beds and offer an even better health care service to the community. Right now roofing is being done, and a mason working team will move in after the roof is complete, after which the carpentry team will move in to install a new ceiling.

That roofing team will then move to the clinic at Igoda Children's Village. This will be the clinic where Dr. Leena will be doing a large portion of her work, not just with the 70+ children at the Children's Village, but also with the community as clinics will be held for the surrounding villages, and the clinic will be open for patients as well year-round. When complete, the clinic will be the first health facility ever opened in the village. After the roofing is complete, the mason workers when finished at Mdabulo will come to plaster the walls, then will come the carpentry team to install its ceiling.

This rotation will continue- roofing, then mason work, then plastering of walls, then ceiling, following the clinic as the teams will follow each other to the Nursery school and office under construction.

Finally, at Mwefu primary school two new classrooms are being built as the community shows great initiative in contribution to their school's development. The roofing; mason work, and ceiling are all being done by an independent team from the Mwefu area.

It is not an insignificant thing to mention that all building is done by local workers, using materials purchased locally. Donations to these building projects don't just get the buildings constructed offering unprecedented services to the community, they also improve the local economy helping the villages lift themselves out of poverty and start to recover from the effects of the HIV pandemic.

Consider the follow a couple of "before" pictures, with progress updates coming next week!

Mdabulo roofing of in-patient ward in progress

One classroom complete, and another (to the left)
on its way at Mwefu Primary School