Tuesday AfricaDigest 12/16/08: How a goat kept Rwandans schooled
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Dec 16, 2008, 8:04:11 AM12/16/08
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How a goat kept Rwandans schooled
By Tony Smith
BBC News, Rwanda
As we drive into the Rwandan village of Nyamikamba, a dawn mist is
gradually lifting.
The single red-brown dirt road is busy with foot traffic. Children are
hauling yellow plastic jerry cans back from a well. Bicycles, loaded
with bananas, are being pushed to market.
The village is four hours from the capital, Kigali, close to the
Ugandan border.
It is poor here; life is hard. Most of Nyamikamba's people are
subsistence farmers, living on less than $1 a day.
There are no Christmas lights and no decorations. It is a world away
from Christmas in the West, where shoppers throng the high street,
fighting for the latest games consoles and "sat-nav" systems.
Yet this is the destination for thousands of dollars worth of
Christmas gifts, given by people in the UK.
Ethical gift catalogues are increasingly popular.
The idea is simple: a gift is bought for a friend or loved one,
anything from seeds to schoolbooks, even a classroom or medical
centre.
The recipient gets a card explaining the idea. The gift itself goes to
the developing world, to someone who needs it, in a place like
Nyamikamba.
Seventeen-year-old Celina Muberarugo found it hard to understand at
first. Her family received a goat three years ago.
But they were grateful and the original goat now has had several kids.
One of these has been sold, enabling the family to pay for a school
uniform.
Without this, Celina says she would have dropped out of school.
"We say thank you," says Celina. "People shouldn't underestimate how
important a goat can be for a family in Africa."
The goat manure has been good for the family's land, so where once
crops failed, now there is food.
Celina's family are subsistence farmers, surviving on the food they
grow.
This year, the goat manure has been good for the family's land. So
where once crops failed, now they are more plentiful.
They have even been able to sell some of their produce at the local
market.
Even though they do not have money for Christmas presents, Celina says
her family will be celebrating.
Home-made decorations, cut from the pages of old newspapers, hang from
the ceiling of the one room where they live, eat and sleep.
Teenage wish list?
Aid agency Oxfam has given away more than 200,000 goats in this way
around the world.
Almost every charity now runs a similar scheme.
Save the Children has a Wishlist catalogue, packed with gifts aimed at
needy children. Help the Aged offers Cows 'n' Things, helping the
elderly overseas.
Eleanor Paish, a British student, bought a goat three years ago and
ever since has shunned the usual teenage wish list of clothes and
music.
"My family will be giving these kinds of gifts again this year," she
says.
"It's fantastic to know that you're buying something that can really
make a difference, much better than the usual stuff you get like socks
and soap."
Oxfam's Stuart Fowkes says it has been hugely successful.
"There's something really tangible about buying someone a goat,
knowing that it is going to be a living, breathing four-legged
creature that is actually going to help someone in the developing
world."
Eager
The benefits are also on show at Celina's school.
Children here are desperate to learn. Hands shoot into the air
whenever the teacher asks a question.
The school itself has been recently refurbished and now boasts 300 new
desks.
And there are unseen benefits to the local economy too, as local
carpenters make the desks rather than them being shipped in from
overseas.
Celina is in her last year at school. She has just taken her final
exams and is waiting for the results.
She hopes to go on to become a journalist, but knows that few here
ever manage to leave the village and build a career.
Charities hope the credit crunch will not affect the popularity of
such gifts.
"It's extraordinary that for £15 ($22) you can change someone's life,"
says Dame Hilary Blume, founder of the Good Gifts Catalogue.
"What would you rather do, buy three bars of soap from someone, or
give sight to a blind child?"
She is fearful that the global economic downturn may affect sales.
"It's a little bit early to tell, but we think the number of gifts
we're selling is the same," she says. "But the value of those gifts is
probably down. People are spending less. People are scared of spending
money because they don't know what's in the pipeline."
Thronging with patients
In the Oxfam catalogue a medical check-up costs just £6 ($9).
In reality, the charity puts those donations together, pooling the
money until there is enough to finance a health clinic.
One has been built in the village of Kabuga, a half-hour drive from
Celina's house in north-eastern Rwanda.
When we visit, the clinic is thronging with patients waiting to be
seen.
A mother is clutching a baby girl, her eyes listless with the onset of
malaria. In the clinic's only ward, two twin boys, just three months
old, are recovering from pneumonia.
Outside, a queue of expectant mothers is waiting to attend a maternity
clinic.
They are waiting patiently on a bench; appointments have been delayed
because one woman has just gone into labour.
We hear the wail of a newborn baby boy and find him wrapped in a
blanket.
"Before this place was here, expectant mothers would have had to walk
three hours to get medical help," says Jean-Baptiste Nduhirabandi, the
clinic's head nurse.
"Many of them wouldn't have made it. Without this place, there's no
doubt that the more vulnerable children would die."
Story from BBC NEWS:
------------------
War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector
enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. -
John F. Kennedy, 35th US president (1917-1963)
--------------------------
This posting is provided without permission of the copyright owner for
purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship, and research under the
"Fair Use" provisions of U.S.Government copyright laws and it may not
be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. The
sender does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the message,
which is the sole responsibility of the copyright
By Tony Smith
BBC News, Rwanda
As we drive into the Rwandan village of Nyamikamba, a dawn mist is
gradually lifting.
The single red-brown dirt road is busy with foot traffic. Children are
hauling yellow plastic jerry cans back from a well. Bicycles, loaded
with bananas, are being pushed to market.
The village is four hours from the capital, Kigali, close to the
Ugandan border.
It is poor here; life is hard. Most of Nyamikamba's people are
subsistence farmers, living on less than $1 a day.
There are no Christmas lights and no decorations. It is a world away
from Christmas in the West, where shoppers throng the high street,
fighting for the latest games consoles and "sat-nav" systems.
Yet this is the destination for thousands of dollars worth of
Christmas gifts, given by people in the UK.
Ethical gift catalogues are increasingly popular.
The idea is simple: a gift is bought for a friend or loved one,
anything from seeds to schoolbooks, even a classroom or medical
centre.
The recipient gets a card explaining the idea. The gift itself goes to
the developing world, to someone who needs it, in a place like
Nyamikamba.
Seventeen-year-old Celina Muberarugo found it hard to understand at
first. Her family received a goat three years ago.
But they were grateful and the original goat now has had several kids.
One of these has been sold, enabling the family to pay for a school
uniform.
Without this, Celina says she would have dropped out of school.
"We say thank you," says Celina. "People shouldn't underestimate how
important a goat can be for a family in Africa."
The goat manure has been good for the family's land, so where once
crops failed, now there is food.
Celina's family are subsistence farmers, surviving on the food they
grow.
This year, the goat manure has been good for the family's land. So
where once crops failed, now they are more plentiful.
They have even been able to sell some of their produce at the local
market.
Even though they do not have money for Christmas presents, Celina says
her family will be celebrating.
Home-made decorations, cut from the pages of old newspapers, hang from
the ceiling of the one room where they live, eat and sleep.
Teenage wish list?
Aid agency Oxfam has given away more than 200,000 goats in this way
around the world.
Almost every charity now runs a similar scheme.
Save the Children has a Wishlist catalogue, packed with gifts aimed at
needy children. Help the Aged offers Cows 'n' Things, helping the
elderly overseas.
Eleanor Paish, a British student, bought a goat three years ago and
ever since has shunned the usual teenage wish list of clothes and
music.
"My family will be giving these kinds of gifts again this year," she
says.
"It's fantastic to know that you're buying something that can really
make a difference, much better than the usual stuff you get like socks
and soap."
Oxfam's Stuart Fowkes says it has been hugely successful.
"There's something really tangible about buying someone a goat,
knowing that it is going to be a living, breathing four-legged
creature that is actually going to help someone in the developing
world."
Eager
The benefits are also on show at Celina's school.
Children here are desperate to learn. Hands shoot into the air
whenever the teacher asks a question.
The school itself has been recently refurbished and now boasts 300 new
desks.
And there are unseen benefits to the local economy too, as local
carpenters make the desks rather than them being shipped in from
overseas.
Celina is in her last year at school. She has just taken her final
exams and is waiting for the results.
She hopes to go on to become a journalist, but knows that few here
ever manage to leave the village and build a career.
Charities hope the credit crunch will not affect the popularity of
such gifts.
"It's extraordinary that for £15 ($22) you can change someone's life,"
says Dame Hilary Blume, founder of the Good Gifts Catalogue.
"What would you rather do, buy three bars of soap from someone, or
give sight to a blind child?"
She is fearful that the global economic downturn may affect sales.
"It's a little bit early to tell, but we think the number of gifts
we're selling is the same," she says. "But the value of those gifts is
probably down. People are spending less. People are scared of spending
money because they don't know what's in the pipeline."
Thronging with patients
In the Oxfam catalogue a medical check-up costs just £6 ($9).
In reality, the charity puts those donations together, pooling the
money until there is enough to finance a health clinic.
One has been built in the village of Kabuga, a half-hour drive from
Celina's house in north-eastern Rwanda.
When we visit, the clinic is thronging with patients waiting to be
seen.
A mother is clutching a baby girl, her eyes listless with the onset of
malaria. In the clinic's only ward, two twin boys, just three months
old, are recovering from pneumonia.
Outside, a queue of expectant mothers is waiting to attend a maternity
clinic.
They are waiting patiently on a bench; appointments have been delayed
because one woman has just gone into labour.
We hear the wail of a newborn baby boy and find him wrapped in a
blanket.
"Before this place was here, expectant mothers would have had to walk
three hours to get medical help," says Jean-Baptiste Nduhirabandi, the
clinic's head nurse.
"Many of them wouldn't have made it. Without this place, there's no
doubt that the more vulnerable children would die."
Story from BBC NEWS:
------------------
War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector
enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. -
John F. Kennedy, 35th US president (1917-1963)
--------------------------
This posting is provided without permission of the copyright owner for
purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship, and research under the
"Fair Use" provisions of U.S.Government copyright laws and it may not
be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. The
sender does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the message,
which is the sole responsibility of the copyright
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