Letter from the Project Manager
Well I am starting to feel a bit of pressure writing the newsletters nowadays, our circulation as grown from only 87 people six months ago to 393 as of yesterday. Of that 92 new sign-on's have been in the last month. Thanks to you all for showing your interest in our projects. With the present global economic situation we really need as much support as possible in order to keep the ball rolling so I sincerely hope that those that have subscribed to the newsletter will continue to pass on our message.
We have the Indaba tourism conference happening in the next couple of days and that will mark the anniversary of our launch. It has been a very exciting year and we have been fortunate to be involved in some very special projects. It must be said, however, that the success of these projects rests on the commitment of the people involved in them and I think it appropriate to give our heartfelt thanks to Louis Fourie, Sister Kerri and Maxi Melville, Susan Slotar, Candice Segal, Pualine Stuart, Harry Van Der Linde and Francois du Toit amongst others.
So, lets hope for the best for the coming year and I look forward to giving twice as many people thanks in a years time.
Keep spreading the word, and thanks for your support.
The Jane Goodall Institute and the Kildare community food garden.
Proving yet again how this awesome organisation is looking at a holistic approach to sustainable development in its entirety, JGI and roots and shoots has established the Kildare community food garden. The goal of this project is to fund and develop over a period of one to five years a sustainable community vegetable garden and orchard in a South African village stricken by poverty and highly affected by HIV/AIDS. The green garden will supply food. It is also intended to be an oasis and a site for the promotion of healthy living, employment and agricultural education.
The garden site is located in ward 26, Mpumalanga Province, near Ximhungwe Post office in Kildare B trust, under the leadership of Councillor Violet Nkuna. It is supported by the Kildare B Community Development Forum. Agricultural usage rights for two hectares of tribal land has been granted for fifty years for this project by the Jongilanga Tribal Authority.
At present the project is in dire need of basic resources and equipment. The greatest issue facing the project is the absence of a local water source on the site. Presently water is transported weekly in 20 litre plastic containers. A long term but expensive solution to this is to have a borehole placed on the site. Another solution is to use a water source approximately 200-300 metres away to pump water to a water tank.
The site lacks basic facilities such as a storage room, gardening equipment and functional toilet facilities. Additionally approximately 10 women from the community are volunteering their time and services to care for the garden and it would be beneficial not only to provide them with some kind of stipend but also provide training in this field.
The Ngwavuma Mpontshini School and child care centre.
The Mpontshini School project at Ngwavuma continues under the dedicated leadership of Hlengiwe Mthimkulu, amidst desperate poverty. That being said the community doesn't take things lying down and the vegetable garden that we covered in January has been flourishing after the summer rains. Now the challenge is to be able to continue on with this productive agricultural project throughout the dry winter months lying ahead. With no access to irrigation or a constant water supply, the vegetable garden is often left to the vagaries of nature. Tremendous heat and no water can quickly destroy months of hard work and we hope that plans by local government for water provision in the area will come into effect to help ease their burden.
The most recent addition to the school is the library, albeit very basic, which requires constant upgrading and maintenance. So for those of you who are over-loading your bookshelves at home and considering renting storage space, give a thought to benefits that you could make in this remote and deserving school. Other resources are even more limited, and the kids have no access to computers and modern technology but plans are afoot to be able to supply the school with a steady stream of power that will lay the foundations for future plans of this nature. Francois and Gavin from ZCSD are attempting to set up a regular telecommunications system with Hlengiwe and her team and this will provide feedback on the progress and challenges relating to the project
The Gwexintaba Community
So we have been lamenting the lack of running water for irrigation and sanitation in this community for quite some time now, and I am very pleased to not have to repeat the same pattern in this month's newsletter. It turns out that Louis isn't just a philanthropist of the first order, he's a bit of an engineer to boot. With electrification of the area still a far off reality Louis has brought in some old-fashioned high-tec to start addressing the problem of water supply. To this end he has built two nifty pump systems (pictured below) to start pumping water up to the highest point in the community (2300L per day actually).
This highest point in the community is the start of the first community laundry washing area with an 80 litre drum rotating on a centre turning axel. From there the water first flows through a Comfrey plantation (an organic nitrogen fertilizer) to clean the water, then through bananas trees to clean it further. This naturally purified water filters back into the underground water which is providing additional clean water for lots of villagers through existing wells. In this way they gain from more, and cleaner water, free fertilizer, bananas and compost. That being said the project is still a way off from being able to manage drinking water supplies fully, and we are holding thumbs that the Nomad Adventure Tours team will be able to secure assistance from an international group to help provide the necessaries for the final stages of the project. Go Vashti and Beate!
We hope you've enjoyed this update of our projects, if so, please forward this newsletter onto people that you think might be interested in helping African development, or refer them to the
Nomad African Trust website for more news. Don't be shy to send us a mail at info@nomadafricantrust.co.za if you have any comments or queries. Looking forward to hearing from you, until next time, sala gahle, tot siens!
