Christian Aid report to the united reformed church

Commitment for Life programme - Zimbabwe 2006

In 2005/06, Christian Aid spent almost £800,000 supporting work in Zimbabwe.
Of this, £71,330 went to Dabane Trust and £48,000 to Silveira House.

Context:

In 2005/06, Zimbabwe’s crisis continued. The country faces serious food shortages, a crumbling economy and one of the world's highest rates of HIV/AIDS.

On top of this, in May 2005, the re-elected Zimbabwean government embarked on a massive ‘clean up campaign’ that left hundreds of thousands homeless or jobless. Many Zimbabweans referred to this wave of destruction as a ‘manmade tsunami’.

HIV and AIDS
Almost one in four adults in Zimbabwe is HIV-positive. Since 1990, life expectancy has dropped from over 60 to just 37 years.

Economic crisis
Zimbabwe ’s inflation rate currently stands at over 1000%, the highest in the world. The country is facing soaring poverty and unemployment, and there are serious shortages of food, fuel, foreign currency and basic goods.

Food shortages
Zimbabwe, once the ‘bread-basket’ of southern Africa, continues to face serious food shortages because of drought, the devastating impact of HIV and AIDS, and the disruption to agriculture caused by the government's land redistribution programme. Once again in 2005/06, millions in Zimbabwe needed food aid.

Home demolitions
The UN says that 700,000 people lost their homes and/or jobs when, in May 2005, the Zimbabwean government tore down houses and market stalls across the country as part of a ‘clean up campaign’. Many of those affected are still living in desperate conditions.

 

Christian Aid in Zimbabwe

In 2005/06 we supported 13 partners in Zimbabwe. Their work focuses on:

• emergency response

• HIV and AIDS prevention and care

• helping people to grow/buy enough food

• pressuring decision makers to treat people fairly

Our partners continue to work in a very challenging context of political and financial insecurity.

In 2006/07, we are reviewing our work in Zimbabwe to set out how best to respond to the ongoing national crisis. We plan to work with 10 partners during this year.

Emergency response: food shortages
Since 2001, Christian Aid-funded food emergency work in Zimbabwe has helped more than 1.3 million people.

Through the worst months of hunger in 2005/06, our partners provided 38,000 school children with one meal a day, and 8,400 people a month with a standard food basket of maize, oil, corn soya blend and beans.

Emergency response: home and stall demolitions
The Zimbabwean government started tearing down people’s homes and market stalls in May 2005 as part of a ‘clean up campaign’.

Our partners immediately stepped in to provide emergency food, clothing, blankets and shelter for the homeless and jobless. Christian Aid launched an emergency appeal to support their work.

The appeal raised more than £70,000. All of this money has now been spent. Some was used in the immediate aftermath of the operation. The rest is now being used, by Silveira House, to help small family businesses across the country to get back on their feet.

Dabane Trust

“We were eating two meals a day in the hungry season. Our neighbours were only eating one – so our garden gave us an extra meal a day” Jennifer (45), Thutukani garden, Matobo district

Dabane Trust works with communities in Matabeleland – one of Zimbabwe’s driest areas. Dabane helps people develop low-cost water supplies, such as dams and water tanks, so that they can grow more crops and provide water for their families and their animals.

Throughout 2005/06, Dabane Trust has continued with this core work. We sent £30,000 to support this work in November 2005.

This grant, which we sent a few months earlier than originally planned, is the first of three planned annual grants in a new three-year funding cycle, running from 06/07-08/09.

Dabane’s performance during the last three-year funding cycle (03/04-05/06) is outlined below.

• Dams
  Target: help communities build 15 earth dams and masonry weirs
  Achievement: 10 dams built (66.6%). 5 dams delayed due to inflation affecting costs, and the withdrawal of one of Dabane’s other donors

• Animal drinking troughs
  Target: help communities build 15 troughs
  Achievement: 16 troughs and 1 animal dip tank built (100%+)

• Rainwater harvesting tanks
  Target: help communities build 12 tanks
  Achievement: 12 tanks built (100%)

• Irrigated gardens
  Target: help communities set up 18 plots to grow crops under irrigation
  Achievement: 20 plots set up (100%+) – including an extra two plots that were near to other productive plots

• Dam-fed irrigated gardens
  Target: help communities set up 16 plots to grow crops under irrigation, using water stored by the dams
  Achievement: 6 plots (37.5%). Other plots could not be set up as the dams themselves are not yet complete.

• Toilets/latrines
  Target: help communities build 300 toilets
  Achievement: 150 toilets already built, with materials secured for another 50 (66%). 100 will not be built because of a funding shortfall.

• Clean water sources
  Target: help communities build 2 sand filtration wells, 6 infiltration wells, 4 slow sand filter tanks and 4 dam-fed sand abstraction tanks
  Achievement: 1 sand filtration well, 2 infiltration wells, 4 slow sand filter tanks and 2 dam-fed sand abstraction tanks built (56%). Two dam-fed tanks delayed because the dams themselves are not yet finished, others delayed as the original choice of sites was not appropriate.

• Food preservation courses
  Target: run 18 courses teaching people how to dry and store food so they can keep more for the ‘hungry season’
  Achievement: 4 courses run (22%) – repeated drought has meant that most people haven’t grown enough food to preserve any

• Grinding mills
  Target: help communities set up 6 grinding mills to grind grain into flour
  Achievement: 6 mills set up (100%) but most equipment has not been used because of drought.

• Seed multiplication groups
  Target: to set up and support 9 farmers’ groups in growing crops to provide drought-tolerant seed
  Achievement: 9 groups set up (100%), but drought limited productivity

• Training skills courses
  Target: run 48 training courses to help people learn farming and water source management skills
  Achievement: 49 courses run (100%+)

• Artisan workshops
  Target: Set up 6 workshops to train people in making and repairing agricultural tools and household furniture
  Achievement: 3 workshops set up (50%), but project then suspended because of high running costs

• Health, sanitation and HIV/AIDS awareness
  Target: run 18 training courses to help people learn about health, hygiene, sanitation and HIV and AIDS
  Achievement: 20 workshops run (100%+)

In May 2005, we also sent Dabane £41,330 of EU funding for their drought recovery project, which aims to teach people ‘conservation farming skills’. These are particularly appropriate to dry areas, as they focus on conserving moisture and preventing fertile topsoil from being eroded away.

This grant is the first of two planned annual grants in a two-year funding cycle. Next year’s grant will be for £10,000.

Silveira House

Silveira House is a development education centre. It runs training courses in skills such as blacksmithing and welding, and helping trainees to set up small businesses. It also carries out civic education, advocacy and leadership training and conflict resolution work in local communities, where political views are often very polarized.

Christian Aid currently supports Silveira House’s HIV/AIDS programme and an emergency programme helping businesses that were affected by the 2005 demolitions to get back on their feet.

HIV/AIDS awareness

This three-year programme was originally due to run from 2004 to 2006. However, the project faced delays early on. This was because of 1) initial planning and surveys taking longer than anticipated and 2) the uncertain operating environment around the time the NGO bill was proposed.

Because of these delays, the programme will now run until 2007. We have postponed our 05/06 grant, and are sending the next £30,000 grant in 06/07 instead.

There are two parts to this programme. The first is to develop and implement an HIV policy for Silveira House’s staff. The second is to carry out HIV awareness and prevention work with small family businesses – often set up by graduates of Silveira House’s training courses.

HIV policy for staff

“I’ve been in this job fifteen years and in that time five or six of my colleagues have passed away, and their families are still suffering”, Aaron, Silveira House

HIV has a huge impact on Christian Aid partner organizations. Members of staff who are unwell or who are caring for relatives or attending funerals cannot possibly work at full capacity, and this places a huge burden on them and their colleagues.

Many people in Zimbabwe, including partner employees and their families, still don’t fully understand the basic facts about HIV. There is widespread fear, stigma and silence. Many people find it hard to speak openly about sex and HIV.

This makes Silveira House’s achievement in successfully developing a staff policy all the more impressive. The policy was developed in 04/05. This year – 05/06 – has been a year of implementation.

Achievements in 05/06

• 50 out of 63 staff completed a basic HIV and AIDS awareness survey
• A five-person HIV task force set up to implement the policy
• Staff presentation by Zimbabwe Association of Church-related Hospitals
• Three HIV awareness workshops for staff
• Under the new policy, staff members have been provided with transport if they need to go to the health clinic or go home because they are sick
• Staff have been encouraged to find out their HIV status, and at least three staff members have gone for voluntary counselling and testing (VCT)

HIV awareness among small family businesses

“One of my workers has just been tested…I’m paying for his ARVs. Before the training I didn’t know what ARVs were” Stanley (33), Silveira House graduate and welding business owner

(ARVS are anti-retrovirals – life-saving drugs that, if taken properly, stop the progression of HIV.)

Silveira House has helped young people set up more than 500 small businesses. But HIV has the power to undo all of these young entrepreneurs’ efforts to lift themselves and their families out of poverty. If they fall ill and die, their business is likely to die too, and all their efforts will be wasted.

Under this project, all Silveira House graduates in Mashonaland and Harare automatically undergo HIV training. These one-day workshops tell people about:

• basic facts about HIV
• nutrition for people living with HIV
• local counselling and testing centres
• life-saving anti-retroviral drugs
• medicines to stop mother-to-child transmission
• the impact of HIV in the work place
• care and support for people who are HIV positive
• basic herbal remedies for opportunistic infections
• how to ensure the continuation of a family business if the business owner falls ill or dies

In the six months from July to December 2005, Silveira House ran 10 workshops in various locations: Harare, Guruve, Rushinga, Mhondoro, Mahusekwa, Magunje and Manhenga.

These reached 229 people, including brick-makers, carpenters, blacksmiths, welders, furniture-makers and dressmakers.

There have been two notable additions to the course content in 05/06: linking with local counselling and testing centres and providing information about herbal remedies.

The herbal information has been particularly important during 05/06, as Zimbabwe’s economic crisis has caused a serious shortage in conventional medicines. At the Mahusekwa workshop, 29 out of 33 participants took the opportunity to consult the herbalist present.

Emergency support for businesses affected by Operation Murambatsvina

“They destroyed all the buildings we were using. We spent almost five months without doing any business.” Gift (27), who used to work for an upholstery company in Chitungwiza

Many graduates of Silveira House training programmes lost their homes and/or livelihoods during the ‘clean-up campaign’ that started in May 2005. Silveira House tried to trace its graduates in the affected areas, but unfortunately was unable to find many of those whose homes were destroyed.

In Harare and the nearby township of Chitungwiza, almost all of the graduates that Silveira House was able to trace had their workshops torn down.

With £48,000 funding donated in response to Christian Aid’s emergency appeal, Silveira House has started a one-year project to help 60 carpentry and welding businesses to get back on their feet.

The first phase has been to gather information about how each of the businesses has been affected, what tools and equipment they have lost and what resources they still have.