Projects in Year 2022
Africa
Benin
ASEP requested funding to dig a well and construct a water tower to avoid long trips during dry periods and fight against water diseases that have even caused deaths of children and pregnant women. Maintenance would be provided by a small fee at each water intake. A management committee set up with a representative of local authorities, two women and one ASEP member.
Benin
The project concerns the construction of a unit for processing cassava into gari (flour) for a group of 48 vulnerable women. The project will indirectly benefit approximately 245 family members as well as cassava producers. The processing unit will include a workshop, a storage store and processing equipment. This will multiply production by 5. The raw material is available, and a market exists for marketing. A management committee will ensure the management and the equipment’s maintenance.
Cameroon
The NGO N-CARE (Nature-Care) has asked to fund its project to develop cranberry culture for 448 women who have returned to their home communities after having to flee armed conflicts. The development of this crop, which is expected to increase production by 50%, will be based on training for production and marketing, particularly in workshops and demonstration farms, as well as monitoring every three months. There are also plans to include vegetables in the value chain.
Democratic Republic of the Congo
This is the third part of a three-year project. The first was construction of an orphanage and was completed in 2020; the second funded the equipment, furniture and energy and was successfully completed in 2021. This project aimed at improving children’s nutrition and health by creating fish farming which involved the digging of 6 ponds, the supply of water and the acquisition of a freezer for harvested fish.
Ghana
The UPCO NGO received funds to finance the supply of furniture and educational materials for a school in a slum in Accra. These are tables and chairs for students and teachers.
Kenya
The NGO MCESO (Murera Community Empowerment and Support Organization) was seeking funding to provide school benches to primary schools in three villages. Currently students are forced to sit at 4 or 6 per desk, making attention, reading, and writing difficult. These costs, although reasonable, are not covered by the government.
Kenya
The Kenyan Riley Orton Foundation (ROF) has asked to fund the installation of a solar pump for a well that has already been drilled and its water quality has been verified. This project will benefit 50 school students and community members and their families. A management committee will be set up to ensure the maintenance, by collecting a fee.
Madagascar
The French NGO ESF (Electriciens sans Frontières) wanted to launch in Madagascar a solar electrification program for 6 schools and 2 health centers, divided into three villages without electricity. The beneficiaries would be 1722 children for primary schools, colleges, and high schools and 19,980 inhabitants for health centers. The total budget amounted to about 135,000 EUR plus about 60,000 for a part of the equipment (valorization of donations from French companies). We contributed to the program for the electrification of two health centres.
This project has been co-financed by Solar Solidarity International asbl
Tanzania
The A Joy school was set up by a group of teachers and registered in 2017. It currently provides care and education for about 150 children a year. The school has 6 classrooms, a kitchen and a vegetable garden, toilets and a borehole. Due to an initial lack of funding the current toilet block has only a hard board separation between the boys and girls side, not offering sufficient privacy for the girls. The school is requesting funding for a second toilet block (4 cabins) with a small changing room for the (older) girls and for a permanent hand washing station where 10 to 15 children can wash their hands at once.
Tanzania
The NGO BIDII (Benevolent Institute of Development Initiatives in Tanzania) has requested funding to set a pig farming in help of 80 women (including widows and very young mothers). Each woman will receive one female and return 2 pigs to the NGO to allow the extension of the project to new beneficiaries. After training, the NGO will provide veterinary treatment. Different marketing strategies have been planned in the face of increasing demand.
Tanzania
Mokonona Secondary School has asked to finance the digging of a well to provide water access to the 1,800 students attending the school and coming from 8 villages. The nearest spring is about 6 km from the school and the water is not safe. A geological survey has been conducted and following its positive conclusion, the well has been drilled. The project has been cofounded by Tanzanian Development Trust
which supported the cost of the solar pump, the sink, and the reservoir.
Togo
The Togolese association PERJAT (PERma-jardins du Togo) has asked to finance a project of market gardening in permaculture to give food security and income-generating activity to 50 women in difficult situations (widows, abandoned or mothers-daughters). This project will also benefit their children (300). This activity is expected to triple their monthly income. The funding requested is mainly for a water-efficient irrigation system. This activity will also reduce deforestation, as these women mainly live from the manufacture of charcoal.
This project has been co-funded by the Association Femmes d’Europe asbl
Togo
NGO PRODIDA-PROISDA asked to finance the drinking water equipment of a village to improve the sanitary situation and avoid long distances on foot to obtain drinking water. The well will be equipped with an electric pump because of the great depth of the water table. The maintenance will be financed by contributions from recipient households. It was the Committee’s view that water’s conditions should be assured before financing the pump and generator. The project has been paid in two instalments: 1) drilling to verify the water condition and 2) pump and generator.
Uganda
The project involves water and sanitation improvements to a primary school in Kasugu community. It is planned to last 12 months and includes the construction of a borehole to provide the school and the community with adequate and clean water, a 5-stance VIP-pit latrine at the primary school, construct 2 multiple hand-washing stations, facilitate the formation of a school WASH club, water user committee and promotion among both the community and school population to adopt good hygiene practices in order to address the sanitation and health problems.
Uganda
The Ugandan NGO SRCDO (Snow Rural Community Development Organisation) has requested funding to improve maize production, making better use of production technologies and employing an improved variety of maize. The project will cover 200 local farmers in 20 groups of 10 in two villages. It will also create 20 demonstration gardens for training that will also focus on commercialization. The income of the beneficiaries could increase by up to 83%.
Uganda
YAWE foundation is dedicated to helping and working to empower the HIV positive youth and which has suffered the worst experiences of HIV/AIDS related stigma and discrimination right from their families of origin.
The project for which they are seeking support is to equip Welding and Carpentry Training Workshops at the Centre for Vocational Skills and train some twenty students annually. YAWE also participates in identifying potential employers and recommending graduates to them.
Uganda
The NGO MUWADA (Muwange Development Association) has requested funding for an infrastructure to store water from a source and provide access points with taps using pipes. This NGO was founded by academics who wanted to help their home communities. The source will be protected to avoid animal pollution. The infrastructure will be managed by a committee and financed by minimal fees. It will benefit nearly 65 households, or nearly 520 people.
Uganda
The NGO AWEI (Alpha Women Empowerment Initiative) was looking for funding to improve upland rice farming instead of rice fields, which requires less water. Improvements will be made through training and demonstration gardens. Beneficiaries will be divided into three groups of 20 women. The budget requested concerns the granting of tarpaulins to cover the fields and bags for storage. Marketing meetings will also be held, with improved rice selling more than twice as much.
Zambia
The NGO CCCYD (Charity Centre for Children and Youth Development) has requested funding for the development of a well and the installation of a pump with a water tank for the children of a school, but which will also benefit the surrounding community. The maintenance of the electric pump will be funded by other projects that will benefit from the well (market gardening, hammer crusher and chicken farming).
Asia
India
The NGO AHIMSA (Association for Human Integrated Massive Social Action) was seeking funds to finance the cultivation of organic vegetables in help of 36 poor women. After a training, seeds will be distributed, and the plants will be regularly irrigated. Beneficiaries will decide how to use the revenues at each monthly meeting.
India
The Social Education and Environmental Development Scheme (SEEDS) was looking for funds to increase the incomes of 150 tribal women in ten villages through a professional beekeeping scheme. To this end, they will receive beehives but also appropriate training as they currently harvest wild honey in a dangerous way in the forest. The NGO has carried out a preliminary feasibility and opportunities study.
India
The project consists in the installation of solar panels in a school in a village in Tamil Nadu, populated by Dalit and tribal people. This facility would solve the problems of power supply, which is affected by frequent power cuts. The current power supply is also insufficient for the use of computers. The installation, including a storage battery, would allow to invest in the school the sums thus saved for the consumption of electricity. It would also serve as a model for other schools in the district.
This project has been co-funded by Solar Solidarirty International asbl.
India
The NGO EDUCATR (Education Communication and Development Trust) wants to fund the revival of small street businesses that had to stop following the COVID pandemic. This project will benefit 48 women who need small amounts of money to restart their street sales by buying products first. They live in a municipality that includes 12 slums and 8 rural villages. A training is also foreseen.
India
The NGO OCD (Organisation for Community Development) wanted to finance three income-generating activities for a group of women, who carry on alone their families, in sectors other than seasonal fishing. These sectors include clothing, shellfish crafts and traditional food. After training, each of the 45 beneficiaries will receive funding to launch one of the three activities.
India
The project involves the manufacturing of cement blocks. 30 poor landless women will be selected – 20 women will form a Self-Help group and will be permanently involved in cement block making, while 10 women will be kept on the waiting list in case someone leaves the project due to unavoidable circumstances. Currently the women work only approximately 4 months a year as agricultural labour and do not have regular income for the rest of the year. The women who will join the cement block unit, will be fully involved, and will not have to do the seasonal agricultural jobs anymore.
India
The Indian NGO Smile Trust has asked to finance the construction of a home for vulnerable children, specifically a one-story building, the ground floor building having been funded by the NGO Children Are the Future (CAF) which visits them every year. It is about giving these children a safe environment in which to study that meets their educational and health needs in a family atmosphere.
Lebanon
The Belgian NGO Belgian Overseas Support has asked to finance the installation of solar panels in a center for Syrian refugees in Lebanon, in a mountain town near the Syrian border. They should provide electricity for all 312 students. Proper heating is also planned due to the harsh winter. In case refugees are repatriated later, the equipment will be handed over to the local public school.
Pakistan
The proposed project aims at upgrading the Rimsha Masih Community School. The request concerns the electricity by installing solar system, the provision of furniture and of safe drinking water to the children by installing solar powered borehole. It is Committee’s opinion – seen the lack of available funds – that only the solar system and the borehole can be funded as more urgent than the furniture.