What is one supposed to think? (take 2)

Two things in the past week that have happened:

I have been asking myself why I am ready to invest my hard earn cash into some Shea Butter processing somewhere in Northern Ghana? As I write this the first building is been completed and things are moving ahead of schedule. I know that what I am doing will not change the system or make "systemic and disruptive change"s as George would say.

In part it’s because of the personal connection I developed with the Taha community. It has to do also with their response to be challenge I gave them. In the end there are maybe thousands of small communities in more remote areas that deserve a hand. Maybe they have even more pressing needs. Taha is my surrogate Ghanaian village, my family here on the Dark Continent. From a development point of view it may not make much sense but much of what is being done in the development sector doesn’t make much sense anyway.

It’s also in part because of my own African experience. After spending a full month in Toronto “learning” about development and all the different ways we are at EWB making changes. After spending the past four months on my own change project and observing what all the other EWBers are doing; I want to make concrete changes. I found my Dorothy and I want to do something that will make her life better. I have seen the impact of similar projects on a community and it doesn’t solve their problems but it helps and makes their life a little better.

And thirdly, all of the above could be just a pile of bull droppings, perhaps I am just being self indulgent.

While in discussion with the 5 member, executive the subject of the Secretary came up. Abdulai will be the interim Secretary and I didn’t understand why. They explained to me that they couldn’t find a woman qualified for the job, a woman who could read and write. You hear it right people; a village of 800 souls and there is no woman or young girl who can read or write. How on earth could this be? Taha is a stone's throw from Tamale the biggest city in Northern Ghana. It’s a small village with no electricity but already under attack from urban sprawl. I could write in length about education, or the lack thereof, or it’s necessity but all that I can think is the how the hell is this possible?

I took Siera to the Tamale Teaching Hospital on Monday for a follow up on some of her tests. The attending physician did his consultation on a table with a few plastic chairs in the middle of the mens ward. He made it clear to Siera that she should never be admitted to this hospital, it’s not a healthy place. We sat there between a few beds with patients in them and it took some time. When the doctor finally came he apologized profusely for making us wait.

There is a man who came to the hospital some time ago to be treated but didn’t have insurance. He was prescribed medications but his family having problem raising the money ($15 Canadian) only bought half of the medication. But after taking the meds he felt fine for a while. He came to the hospital that evening because he got sick again. He waited longer then he should have because the family had difficulties raising the money for the consultation ($6 Canadian). As we were sitting there he was already on oxygen and without a special med ($15 Canadian) to reduce the swelling of his brain he would die within an hour. The family now was struggling not only to get the money but to find the meds since it seems that everyone in Tamale was out. While sitting there during Siera’s consultation I couldn’t help peeking once in a while at the curtain down the hall with the dying man behind.

After the consultation we drove back to Gumany and by the time I went to grab some dinner the man was dead. I have a very hard time driving by someone with a flat tire on the side of the road, or by someone stuck in a snow bank. It made me feel that I just drove by and didn’t stop and yet there is nothing I could have done. The money in my pocket was useless. From the ignorance of that person in not understanding the initial treatment, the constraint that getting the equivalent of $15 Canadian and the nonavailability of a fairly common medication; the outcome was cast.

Ghana has been beautiful but it also has been hard. Walking by and seeing but choosing not to see. Knowing but forgetting that we know. Remembering just enough so that we can carry on and do our job. I am glad that I am leaving soon because this place could syphon the marrow out of my soul. Maybe I am just not cut out for this place.

I am on my last sprint to the finish line; I have to focus on what I came here to do. I have to stop looking around. In my free time I can play with pieces of wood, concrete, small diesel engine, grinding mill and build stuff; that is something I can do. It feels that it is the only real thing that I know how to do, building stuff.

Who knows, maybe some day a few young girls from Taha will be able to make it to High School? Maybe the Shea Butter processing will help? Just not this year.

Rock & Roll Gushiegu and the Malaria Blues

Three weekends ago I was preparing for my visit to Gushiegu to spend some time with Director Joseph. I don’t know what happened that weekend; I may have got hit by a chronic case of laziness. I could barely get out of bed and get the regular stuff done, like the laundry generated by 5 days of being on the road on the motto.

On Monday morning after packing my stuff I waited for the clinic to open and got tested for Malaria and parasites. The two previous nights I had a short period of high fever, hit the 102 in the middle of the night for a few hours. Then it went back to normal for the rest of the day. I have to mention that I take my temperature often. It’s a tell sign of Malaria and Typhoid Fever. About every bacterial or parasites infections will have the same set of similar symptoms, fever eliminates many options. The oddity with my temperature is that it always registers low. At first I thought it was the calibration of my $10 digital thermometer but after comparing with other thermometers it appears that I am always in the 97.1 to 97.7 degree C range. As opposed to the normal 98.6 C.

Maybe this is why I start sweating before everybody else??? Anyhow I tested negative to everything.

After getting a negative on the entire battery of tests; I hit the dusty trail. I made it to Gushiegu just in time to find out that my Director had been call for a meeting in Tamale and was leaving. Trying to salvage the situation I manage to tag along his MIS officer and get some insight on the District. The next day I went out with one of the extension agent, I least I could spend time getting a good feel for the District. The first night at the guest house, no fever and I got great sleep. Second night, Tuesday, I got the fever and barely slept. So on Wednesday I went to the Gushiegu Hospital to get tested again.

If you are sick, or healthy, the hospital is probably the last place you want to be. The waiting areas were just overcrowded with people sitting on the floor. By the look of it they were just camping waiting to be care for. Fortunately paying cash accelerated things; Paying for the initial consultation, getting the initial consultation, paying for the tests, getting the tests, getting the tests results, paying for the medications, getting the medications, only took 6 hours. Meanwhile people who came before me were still waiting to see a physician. Infants with severe diarrhoea had accident on the floor. Someone would wipe it with a dry cloth and 5 minutes later there would be someone sitting on the same spot. 

One of the waiting area, Gushiegu Hospital.

 I tested +1 for Malaria, which means it was in the early stage. If you are +2 it is very serious, +3 you’ll probably die. The doctor wanted to keep me in for 24 hours and I just refused. I just wanted to get my meds and go back to the Guest House without touching anything. Although I got started right away on the medication my condition kept getting worse. For the rest of that day and the next I just couldn’t get out of bed. Zachary, the innkeeper, made sure that I had food and water at all time. He even did a run to the Chemical Dealer (pharmacist) to get me some re hydration salts and help me to the bathroom a few times.

By Friday morning I was back on my feet. I packed, fed myself and finally got to spend 3 hours with the Director. The ride back home was uneventful except for the many breaks I took along the way to rest and rehydrate in the shade. It took me a while but I made it home safe and before dark.

This is Africa and we get sick. Sometimes it’s really bad, sometimes it’s just a pain in the ass; there are always cheap drugs available to fix the wide array of ailments we can host. But we get sick. You do all the right things; apply copious amount of bug repellent on your body, religiously use the mosquito net, wear long leg pants and long sleeve shirt at night. But you still can get Malaria. We try to eat the right “safe” food and drink the good water but we still end up with diarrhoea and bacterial infections.

As we speak Siera just finished her Malaria treatment, the second in the past month. Marielle was treating hers a few weeks back, Binnu last week. I am just starting to feel better from a severe case of the runs; my first one since my Malaria bout. It wasted my Wednesday and half of my Thursday. By Saturday I felt much better… I could list the ones from the team who got sick in the past month, one way or another, but it would include just about everyone. Maybe there is something we can do better? What can we do better?

Or maybe that’s just the way it is. It’s just where we are.

Africa is beautiful and exciting Mistress, exotic, full of surprises; but she is a demanding one.

Making Shea Butter Part 2:

Things have progressed drastically since the last time I wrote about the women group. I went back a few days after giving them the 100 GHC and they had already processed the first batch of butter. They had turned a net profit of 20 GHC. It seems like a lot of work for this little money but they were very happy with it.

So they can make a profit, humble but still a profit.

The mixing all done by hand

 I gave them another 400 GHC so they can have a bigger working capital and make bigger batches and be more effective. Now the group is up to 60 women and the energy is just intense. As of today they have increased their net profit to around 350 GHC. Essentially in a few weeks they could reimburse me the initial $500 and have some working capital to keep on going.

Cooking the Shea oil to remove the excess water.As it colls off it will take a creamy texture

Meanwhile I connected with Walesu an independent project coordinator. His work is mainly with the Illich Family Foundation. He acts as the project manager and liaison for the Foundation when they sponsor the building of a school or other facilities. He also has a good working relationship with the Taha community; he was the project manager for a school the Foundation build in the village. He is also involved with different Shea processing facilities. With the support of different NGO they have set up processing plants, train the women groups and also have acted as quality control to ensure the produced butter meets international standards.

Abdulai and 2 elders from to women group

A small diesel engine drive the crusher and the mill. If you want to change tool you just move the strap.

 Together we worked out what it would take to build a processing facility with the mill and all. We are still working on the details but it will be over 11000 GHC ($7500 Can.). Meanwhile Karie went back to Canada all excited about the project. She dusted off the rolodex and start contacting wholesaler of cosmetic ingredients; she is getting some traction. In her past life she had a small manufacture of bath products.

The store room for the final product. The black bags are filled with butter. Next it needs to be package in 25 KG boxes.

Last weekend we took 3 of the leaders of the women group to another town where the women have set up shop 30 years ago. They produce on average 1000 Kilos of butter a month that they make for Body Shop. They show us around in details the process they use. They talked about the importance of consistency and quality control. They talked in length of what it did to their community. The women were so impressed and so excited. When they went back to the village and share with the other women of the group all hell broke loose.

They reeeeeaaaalllllyyyy want to do this.

So here’s what I told them:

1-     If they form an official group with a charter and a bank account (in Ghana they can officially register a group and it enables them to do business)

2-     If they get the support of the chief and the chief is ready to give the group the land they need

3-     If the men of the community commit to provide the labour to build the facility

4-     If the woman group commits, as the facility comes on line, to bring their production standards to meet export regulations

5-     If they commit to the training that Walesu will provide

I will find the money.

I just receive a txt on Monday morning and the chief has officially given the land to the women. The men have committed to the building. The executive of the group is in place and Abdulai is part of the executive as the community liaison. They are working on the official papers and the bank account.

We already bought the roasters; they should be delivered to the village as we speak. We are buying some of the other equipment that can be an immediate net benefit for production. Mostly small things like the proper mixing bowls. Since the price of the nuts is likely to rise because of the season we are looking at securing 5,000 to 10,000 KG of nuts to enable them to keep producing for the local market till next July. When I return we’ll work out the final sequence of events for acquiring the mill and the construction and the final budget. We also have to account for ongoing operating costs.

Example of a drying rack in the back and a washing rack in the front. The fence prevents animals like goats to contaminate the site.

 The normal interest for a loan in Ghana is around 28%. I suspect that the total amount including the working capital will be around 15,000 GHC ($11,000 Can.). Our agreement with them is for 10%. It is a decent return if it works but there are substantial risks attached to it.  Ghana is a little far to look after an investment.

The group getting debriefed after the visit.

Until they are fully set up and trained they will keep supplying the local market. We are looking at some of the aggregators like the Body Shop. We are also looking at the Canadian markets; we have a few wholesalers who are interested. The preliminary costing of the different transports and fees indicate that it would be a viable “cottage” business.

So I told Karie to get my sock out from under the mattress and get a thick pile of US dollars to Olivier; my son is coming for a visit on the 15^th. It will be more efficient than using the ATM, 400 GHC at a time.

The game is on.

Dom

Thanksgiving in Ghana:

How was thanksgiving in Ghana? It was awesome!

We had the WAR near Bolga (West Africa Retreat) which was great but is not the subject of this post. I am quite sure that many people have already posted thousands of lines about how inspiring and awesome the WAR was. It was good, don’t get me wrong but I will leave it to the academic types to chronicle all the workshops and the EWB stuff that happened there.

This is about what was the most memorable to me.

Karie and I on the motto

 It started with riding the motto from Tamale to the Farmer Training Center near Bolga with Karie riding shot gun. Sierra (one of my surrogated daughter) was kind enough to take our backpack on the Trotro with her. It took us all day to drive the three hours ride. We first stopped in a Japanese garden where they grow all kind of medicinal plants. We had a tour and were so impressed by the two kids telling us everything about the garden. We stopped chasing those yellow and fluorescent orange birds on the side of the road, taking pictures. We stopped having a chat with Mina who had the crazy idea of riding his bicycle from Tamale to Bolga. We waited for him in Whalewhale while having beans and a beer. He jumps on the Trotto from there and we carried on just enjoying the scenery.

Having a chat with Mina on the side of the road

Sidebar: A guy who doesn`t train or ride much and end up doing more than 100 kms in this kind of heat… kudos Mina.

Dan, a potentially crazy person like me if he doesn`t smarten up, brought a live turkey, it was thanksgiving weekend after all. The problem was, although the turkey looked fine, it was a small bird. After the plucking and the gutting it was a 10 pounds bird max and there were 30 of us. You don’t need to be an experienced chef to know that we had a major shortage of proteins. So I decided that we needed a pig… and I found one. Well, actually I found the person that knew where there was one and Karie walked for miles sealing the deal while I was doing some of the EWB stuff that many people have written thousands of lines about in their blog…

The guy selling the pig brought it to the center on a leash and did the slaughtering. It was a very good deal for him We paid regular price, I  think, and he harvested all the stuff that us North American don`t care much for (like the trips and the brain) and left us with a headless carcase.

Don and I massaging the pig

 Sunday morning after finding a shovel, digging a pit and lining it with stones scavenged from around we were ready to start. I bought a giant bag of coal, gather some wood and we lighted it up. A few of the kids, Maxim, Dan and Romeo, helped with the tending of the fire which was welcomed in the 30+ heat. Meanwhile Don and Dan killed the turkey and prepared it for the oven.

Don and Dan with the plucked bird

 I made a dry rub with whatever I could find and some of Mina’s coffee. Karie made an awesome BBQ sauce. The pig was firmly rubbed and then covered with BBQ goodness. The wrapping was a bit of a problem since we bought a long piece of cloth that we believed to be cotton. It was something synthetic. Since it was Sunday and most of the stores were closed we didn’t think that we could find something in Bolga. So we begged and bribe to get a used piece of cloth that, we were promised, was clean. It was too small but with the help of a few big banana leaves (that were inadvertently freed from the trees in the guest house inner court) we made due.

So we buried the swine in the hot coals and walk away for 7 hours.

Me crrying the coal.

Dan and Maxime helping withthe fire

Lindsay, Siera and Rebecca working at it

Bimu and Romeo working on the desert

 As dinner time came closer the kitchen just became very frantic. Rebecca was working on mash potatoes and Yams. Sierra was on the Tomato salad, Binue was on apple pie. Dinner came a little late which was great since the pig took longer than expected. The last time I cooked a whole pig it was buried in coals for 6 hours and the meat was just falling of the bones. This one after 7 hours was cooked but needed to be carved.

getting the pig out of the coals

Here’s a first for me; it’s the first time ever that I carve a large mammal with a Swiss army knife, the only sharp thing around.

The table got set up buffet style and we all dug in. At some point while eating I told Karie; “this really feels and smells like Thanks Giving”. Seeing all the people eating, laughing and enjoying themselves after all the hard work every one put in; it felt like a big family.

That's a table!

After dinner we had the poetry slam. Not being much of a poet I just told a story. That’s what I do best and like doing; cook and tell stories.

I am thankful that I came to Ghana.

I am thankful that I had Karie with me that wonderful Thanksgiving Sunday.

I am thankful that I got to spend that special weekend with all the EWBers from Ghana and Burkina Faso.

I am also thankful that I was born in Canada and that I am going back there.

There are many more things that I am thankful for, the list is long but it belong somewhere in a more private venue. It should be Thanksgiving everyday just to remind us to be thankful.

Cheers

Dom

How is one supposed to feel? Part ONe

While socializing with the District Director of Agriculture (DDA) and some of his staff I mentioned, I can’t remember why, that I pay around 30% of my salary in income taxes. They had a great time with this bragging that in Ghana they don’t pay income taxes. Which I am not sure if it is accurate, I believe that the government employees do pay income taxes? But as a whole a very small portion of the population or businesses pay taxes, I heard. They may have been exaggerating to tease me.

My answer was “off course you don’t need to pay income taxes, you have the NGOs”

There was not much laughing after that.

The next day in a coaching session with the director we talked about a problem that is persistent in most districts. Most districts have fewer mottos than they have people on the road. The front line personnel, the Extension Agents, are the one travelling the most and meeting the farmers. In Chereponi there are 6 of them. Then there are DAOs and various “experts” that form the next strata of the administrative sandwich. Some of them are required to travel on occasion. In Chereponi the mottos are assigned according to seniority. The 4 available mottos are assigned to the 4 people who spend the most time in the office. None of the Extension Agents have a motto; not one from MOFA anyhow.

So I told the director that 3 years ago CIDA bought many mottos for MOFA (Ministry of Food and Agriculture).  Some say that there was 1200 of them. To this day it’s hard to get a straight answer as to where the mottos are. Some say that there are still mottos waiting to be distributed, some just vanished. Some say that some districts close to the capital, everyone has mottos.

The point is that there is a certain amount of corruption and the main complain of the DDA and their staffs  is MOFA’s inability to distribute the mottos equitably and/or to provide the number of mottos the staffs in the field need.

We accept and hope that some mottos make it to the people they were intended to. How does it feel to know Canadian money was used this way? Whatever it is we feel, there is not much that either the DDA or myself  can do about it. But neither of us likes it.

“But how do you think it feels when I come in a district where there are so few mottos and they are not giving to the people who need them the most? Some of those mottos were bought by a Canadian agency .We know that if the Extension Agents had better access to transportation they would, maybe, help a few more family out of poverty? What’s more important; entitlement and seniority or helping as many people as possible out of poverty?”

“I understand that this is a cultural issue and it is very sensitive. It's not something that you can’t totally change; but this is something you have the power to influence. At the end of the day is about helping the less fortunate of your district? The people you drive by when you drive back home to Tamale on the weekend. The people who live around you, who live around the people with the mottos they don’t really need? This is something that you can influence, in your district.”

How does it feel? That’s what I am asking myself.

Cheers

TThe DDA Fellowship part 2 (or maybe 3); I Have a Dream:

I have been working with the DDA Fellowship for the past 2 months now. Early in my placement I participate in their third meeting of the year, in one of the session we did a Gap analysis to help us understand what kind of skills they are looking at acquiring and improving.

Last week we had our 4^th meeting. The morning was spent in getting an update on their personal district improvement initiatives and we also had a session on Project Management. With decentralisation they will be tasked with increased responsibilities. Since they will have more say on projects and their implementations it stand to reason that they will need a better understanding of Project Management as a whole. I put together a session that explained the major components of PM but also was about asking the right questions. If you have a projects what are the basic questions you should be asking as opposed to try to teach them specific tools.

It was well received; we decided on this session from the result of the previous session’s Gap Analysis.

 The afternoon we had a session with Erin Antclif, my fearless leader, informing the Fellows what’s in store for EWB in 2012. The main themes were:

1-     Building internal capacity to properly support our African Programs

2-     To be more critical in justifying the initiative that we are supporting

3-     Why is EWB here in Africa? To alleviate poverty, to help Dorothy…

Which was followed by a session, facilitated by Siera and Janine, where the Directors were asked to self-reflect on the Most Significant changes they have personally experience as a result of being part of the DDA Fellowship?

The last session, “The DDA fellowship, a Way Forward…” Was the most intense of them al. I started with a pep talk driving home 3 major points:

1-     They should be proud of the work they are doing in the type of condition they are doing it in.

2-     Their work is “Very Important”. When they improve their district, even just a little, it means that there are actual people in need that may be able to eat better or to send one of their children to school. They have a direct impact on Dorothy…

3-     …I Have a Dream to come back to Ghana in 15 or 20 years with my grand child (I haven’t cleared this one with Olivier yet) and not be able to find a NGO. I Have a Dream to come to a DDA fellowship and it’s not run by EWBers. The only EWBers are to ones coming to learn from the Fellowship.

Then I ask about the future of the DDA Fellowship; how could this Fellowship becomes their to own, little by little? How can we shape it for the next year so that it becomes a real fellowship where the more experienced Director help and mentored the others who needs it? How can we help them be proud not only to be a member of the fellowship but to be the ones building it?

I asked them for ideas so that next session, our last of the year, how we can come up with a direction or a vision for a way forward… I also asked them how they wanted to do this, talk in smaller groups? Do they want me to facilitate? Do they want to work on their own?

Doctor Dixon did stand up and told me that for this part I should step aside and they should, the Directors, run the session… I took charge and they went at it. I swear to you, I got a little misty; I was so proud.

They came up with some ideas, some that are pretty good. We could probably have done a better job at getting better ideas if we had facilitated the session. But now those are their ideas which make them much better. They own them.

I still have lots of work ahead of me before the next meeting in a few weeks. I poked at their pride and awaked something in them now we have to put that good energy to good use.

It’s back to my 3 main points:

1-     Be proud

2-     You and what you do, are important

3-     Share my Dream

Over and out for now

Dom

Making Shea Butter Part One

 I went back to Taha to attend the Farmer Group meeting a few days ago. On that occasion they also had the woman group attending. Some of the women are members of both groups.

The womens group is just newly formed and they process shea butter. Shea butter in Ghanian culture is used for cooking, as well as for healing skin rashes. They face some constraints and they hope that by pulling their resources together they can better their situation. As far as I can tell they have two major constraints; they have very limited money-if any-and they have to rely on a mill for part of the processing that is located miles away. They think that if they had their own mill they could increase their output / revenues.

The first part of the process is labour intensive; it consists of grossly crushing the nuts. The crushed nuts are then fried and they are ready to be transport to the mill. The women transport the nuts on their head all the way to the mill and back. From there is the long process of separating the solid from the oil and clarifying the butter. The butter is sold to the market in Tamale, 20 kilometers away.

Meeting with the Farmer and Women Group

 So Karie and I spent some time with them and with a stick I drew the whole process on the ground and ask many questions. I have a pretty good understanding of what it takes to make the butter however the quantitative information is very unclear. It’s difficult to assess how much butter is produced with a certain amount of nuts. They sell the butter in bowls that are piled high over the rim. The quantity of nuts they use will depend on how much they can afford or what is available and sometimes a batch is combines with the left over from another to complete a bowl.

Abdulai doing the translation

They show us a small bowl, left over from the last batch, and Karie and I were very impressed. I have to say that Karie in her previous life did own a bath product manufacture and she used to buy shea butter and would pay $60 a pound. Looking at the women’s group butter she was immediately impressed at the quality and the purity of the product. I evaluate, from my questioning, they are selling what amount to about 10 pounds for 10 Cedis ($7 Canadian Dollars).

But I don’t know for sure.

The women's group embracing the photography

So I decided on the spot to invest in them.  I lend them the money to buy a 50 kilos bag of nuts and the price of the processing; this amounts to 100 Cedis ($70 Canadian Dollars). I expect a small mason jar of butter as my interest payment. I explained to them that they need to measure the time it takes them for each steps and the exact amount of shea butter they will produce with that one bag. Once I have those measures I can evaluate how profitable making butter is. From there I can look at options with them and evaluate if buying a mill is a good option for them...

Those are beautiful strong women who work hard and live very humbly. They are not very different than we are. They are concerned about shelter, food and the future of their children.  They are concerned about making their life better for themselves and their family. The difference is that where they were born they don’t have the same kind of opportunities as we have. 

The bowl on the left is grounded Shea nuts, the second if the extracted oil and the small one is the butter

Here I have to take my learned skills, project management, accounting, Business Planning and reduce it to the simplest of expression.  All the same principles apply but it has to be understood with few words and perhaps a few drawing in the dirt.

Karie and I are very excited about this and we are already thinking of taking as many jar as legally possible in our luggage.