Investing In Lives Exponentially
George Crispi
Sure Foundation Ministry
336-408-2585
On Saturday, September 10th, Phyllis received a letter from Malawi. It was from Marry Pensulo, the teenage daughter of Stanford Pensulo, one of the indigenous pastors we work closely with there. It was postmarked August 24th, so it took seventeen days to reach us. The postage on the letter was 160 Kwacha, or $1.06 US. That's a little over two day's wages for 80% of rural Malawians.
Marry, a pretty, bright, and optimistic girl was Phyllis' translator for one of the two hygiene and sanitation workshops she had conducted for large groups of rural women during our mission in July and August. She always has a big smile, and is quite outgoing. She has big dreams too; when asked by Phyllis, she said she wants to study to be anaesthesiologist, and move to America.
She's also at a very crucial age, as the typical girl in her situation gets discouraged, marries in her early teens, has four to five children she'll be too poor to properly care for. She will remain subservient to her husband for the rest of her life. There is also a reasonable possibility she will lose two of her children in or shortly after delivery, if she herself doesn't die while delivering her firstborn, due to having an underdeveloped pelvis.
Marry's dilemma: Her father, a man who has devoted his entire life to the spreading of God's word, does not earn the kind of money needed to keep her in school, as all schools at the secondary level require tuition, book fees, and uniform costs. Her simple request is that we assist her with the $300 needed for this year's cost of study. We plan to help Marry in whatever way we can, and even have a possible lead on an in-country scholarship for her, and pray it comes through.
So, what's the point? I simply want to show what else $300 will purchase in Malawi.
WELL REPAIR: $300 will cover about 40% of the typical cost of restoring a broken well in one of the rural villages we work in. Once a well is repaired it will enable the women to draw clean, safe water for their families for ten years, on average. Now,when a well is broken, they often have no alternative but to draw contaminated water from rivers, lakes, and even mud holes. There are more than 2.2 million water related deaths a year, affecting mostly children under five.
Hygiene and Sanitation Workshops: $300 will pay for 3 five hour life saving workshops, for groups of about 30 to 35 extremely poor rural women. They will learn about germs, and how they are spread, blocking germ paths, and be shown many sound practices they can apply right away toward making their families healthier. They'll learn about how AIDS is spread, and how to prevent malaria. As the workshop takes them away from their heavy responsibilities for an entire day, they'll be given a sumptuous meal of stewed goat meat, rice, and a finely seasoned vegetable dish. They will then return home to share what they have learned with their husbands and children. In all, over 500 people will have been directly aided by these three workshops.
Safe Birthing Kits: When in Malawi this summer, we were able to deliver 120 “birthing kits” to clinics, and midwives. Assembled for under $1 each, they facilitate safer birthing conditions for both mother and child. Malawi has among the worst records in the world for both infant and maternal mortality. These simple tools save lives. $300 will purchase the materials for four hundred kits. We have volunteers who will help us assemble them.
Dignity Kits: As difficult as it may be to fathom, women and teenage girls in these extremely poor rural areas, don't even have the underwear that people in Western cultures, and many of their urban counterparts take for granted. Sanitary napkins are unheard of. Girls having reached puberty miss on average a week of school each month, too embarrassed to attend. Discouraged, many drop out of school and marry in their early teens. A major clothing manufacturer has graciously donated over three hundred fifty pair of women's underwear, and we are in the midst of making an equal number of washable, reusable cotton sanitary napkins for distribution to local secondary school girls when we return to Malawi in January of 2012. Each kit will contain two pair of underwear, and two reusable napkins. (If a girl is given the opportunity to attend two additional years of school, on average, she will marry four years later, have fewer, and healthier children, and have greater economic opportunity for both herself and her children.) Our hope is to continue having clothing manufacturers donate the necessary underwear. We estimate that we'll be able to make the sanitary napkins for $1 per kit. With packaging, $300 will buy about 145 dignity kits.
Solar Cookers: Malawi is being deforested at a faster rate than any other nation on Earth. As a result, there is much soil erosion, flash flooding in the rainy season, and sinking water tables, with many wells drying up. We are in the research and development phase of delivering an inexpensive solar cooker for distribution, as a means of helping to slow down the loss of forestry. With over 80% of rural Malawians earning under 50 cents, (US) per day, and the prohibitive cost of firewood and charcoal there is the added benefit of giving each household much needed savings. Our ultimate goal is to create small cottage industry for women to manufacture and sell these cookers locally. We estimate that $300 will finance start-up costs for two of these women's cooperatives.
Solar Lighting: With only 1% of rural Malawi's households having access to electricity, and liquid paraffin being expensive and often unavailable, and paraffin lanterns causing respiratory disease, and severe burns to children, a better alternative is most needed. We have been testing several manufacturers' solar lights with excellent results from two particular models. On an eight hour charge, a typical table model will emit up to eight hours of high quality light. With costs offset by free solar energy, even the poorest of the poor will be able to afford solar lamps with time payments. This will enable students to study into the night, and mothers to take care of sick children and perform other important household tasks. We also see great potential for solar lighting sales becoming another small business opportunity for poor women. $300 can help start three rural entrepreneurs into fruitful solar lighting businesses.
Cooking Briquettes and Briquette Presses: This is another technology just waiting to be introduced to this region of Malawi to the benefit of countless households. By collecting and processing abundantly available grasses, corn stalks, corn husks, dried vegetable scraps, sawdust, peanut shells, and other dead vegetation, and using only manpower, an entire industry has been created in other nations. Of particular note is Haiti, which has made great strides in turning around its extreme deforestation crisis, while generating above average incomes for many impoverished men and women. In Malawi, where it is illegal to cut down trees, and charcoal has been banned, and everyone ignores the law because they haven't been offered an alternative. we are confident, that with proper marketing, these considerably less expensive briquettes will swiftly find their niche. Materials for four briquette presses which can give twenty to thirty women full time employment can be purchased and assembled for about $300.
Efficient Briquette Ovens: By far, the most common method of cooking is simply an open fire, commonly known as “three rocks and a pot”. Unfortunately it is also the most wasteful. We have been working on plans for an extremely efficient double brick oven, designed specifically for the cooking briquettes. As the other technologies, these ovens can be priced at a level which would make it available to the area's poor. Red clay is abundantly available, and the ovens would be manufactured locally. We've already discussed plans for manufacture with a local oven maker in Malawi. We estimate that $300 will easily establish three two man teams of oven makers in highly profitable businesses.
Well Drilling: In October, George will be attending a well drilling school in San Angelo, Texas. An ancient Chinese technique for hand drilling wells to a depth of up to 800 feet will be taught. Materials for these wells are fairly inexpensive, and obtainable in a typical hardware store in the Third World. The process is quite labor intensive, so we will partner with villagers where wells are needed. As they supply the manpower, we'll supply the materials and know how. Many of the distances now traveled by women and young girls will be greatly reduced, freeing their time for more beneficial pursuits. For $300 we'll be able to pay for half the cost of our hand-drilling rig.
Bibles: For the most part, believers in the rural areas in which we are working don't own a bible, and if things were to remain just as they are, most likely never will. They are simply that impoverished. Not only will $300 be able to purchase thirty three quality bibles in Chichewa, the local language, but coupled with the projects listed above, many people will begin to afford to purchase them on their own. We also believe many will, as they love the word of God, just as believers throughout the world.
So, what about helping Marry?
Well, we will definitely do what we can for her, and began looking into the possibilities that very evening. As we look at the crisis of abject poverty however, it becomes apparent that when a problem is systemic, the approach to minimizing it must also be system-wide. I have worked in many countries of the world, and just as people in most other places, Malawians are intelligent, and industrious people. The causes of their poverty are manifold, and therefore only a comprehensive, and multifaceted approach to their situation can ever lift them from their poverty.
Our work is being conducted in a number of villages in an area of about 200 square kilometers. Already the documented results of our well restoration efforts are extremely encouraging. The 23 wells we have restored thus far serve on average, 200 families each. With two hours of back-breaking labor , saved fetching water saved per household each day, (a conservative figure), the sum total of hours saved for these 4,600 women over the course of one year is a staggering 3,358,000.
We are in a very real sense indebted to Marry, as her letter helped make very clear the rightness of the approach we believe the Lord has guided us into. Thank you for taking the time to read this paper, and we appreciate any questions or feedback you may have.
Thank you, and God bless you abundantly!
George and Phyllis Crispi
