According to Antoine Chiquet, a co-founder of the Komo Learning Centres and a director and board member of the Segal Family Foundation, the best strategy for meeting the elemental needs of African countries such as Burundi, Kenya and Uganda – from which he recently returned – should be built upon a foundation of common sense.
Food is a good place to start especially when dealing with fluctuating and inflationary food prices in local communities in Uganda. These are elemental problems that require elemental solutions. Mezimbite asked Antoine how he goes about approaching these challenges:
Mezimbite: It is overwhelming, Antoine.
In the previous post from your friend in Burundi entitled Feedback from Africa, we have an insight into the monumental challenges that face the African continent: poverty, malnutrition, disease, deforestation, desertification – a long, long list.
Where to begin?
Nous devons cultiver notre jardin* – Voltaire
Antoine: I begin with what I call Community Development 101.
People need to eat. That is basic. But we all have a personal Profit and Loss (P&L) account:
If you eat food you cannot afford to buy, if you spend money you cannot to afford spend, your expenses are up. Losses are up. Profits are down. The P&L looks bad.
So the first principle I employ in this situation, is to figure out how people can eat without spending all their money. So that money can be freed up for other needs and other activities. And this means the first priority is to provide assistance for people to grow their own food. For this, we provide training workshops and we provide input such as seeds so that people, families, communities, can grow their own food.
Now, once they grow food their expenses are down. Because they do not need to buy the food, they are growing it instead.
Next, we try to encourage and empower them to grow surplus food – in precisely the same way that Allan does at Mezimbite. At Mezimbite, the artisans and their families eat rice and beans and lots of delicious vegetables. But they also grow more than they can eat, which is then sold at market. The revenue from surplus foods is then used to buy access for their families to health and education.
Mezimbite: So now you have gone from a net loss of expenses, to breaking even, and possibly increasing revenue with surplus food sales?
Antoine: Exactly. Food is basic. Food security – in terms of access and stable prices – is a basic need in these African communities. The foundation. So you need to start building a secure, reliable foundation.
Then, we build on the added layers on top of this foundation.
Mezimbite: Layers?
Antoine: Yes, layers of development. From food security, we can take a look at the four pillars or layers of development work: Food, then Health, then Education and then Micro-Enterprise.
Mezimbite: Okay, the layers of food, health and education are self-explanatory. Tell us about micro-enterprise.
Antoine: It’s about finding what the need is, and then providing that need.
With food, some of the enterprising people become small farmers and need micro-loans to grow and harvest their crops. Our policy is to charge them zero percent interest on micro-loans. We don’t want to make money on the loans. We just want to be paid back. We usually get paid back after the first crop cycle, then they are on their way and no longer need our help.
We also provide micro-grants for communities to invest in vital infrastructure like drilling a well, building a classroom.We stick with basic needs. There is no fancy development strategy. Just basic common sense. And one step at a time.
The key in this approach is that communities take ownership in their projects, we’re just the facilitator.
Mezimbite: Some of us, like Allan and I who went to MIT, are a bit over-educated and have a tendency to slip back into our fascination for intricate development strategies and elaborate white papers. We are policy wonks in recovery. Common sense is a whole new paradigm for us – can you tell us more about basic common sense?
Antoine: What do you sleep on at night? A mattress. What do you need to study at night if you are a schoolchild? A lamp. What do you need to if you are an ambitious school child in Uganda and you want to learn another language, like French? An old used, French-English dictionary.
We had over 40 children who had to squat under one roof in the early days. The children slept on the floor. One of our workers suggested we buy some mattresses. It was what they needed at the time and it made a huge difference. Simple.
We found that a lot of students could not study at night because of unreliable generators and power outages. So we began plans to install solar panels to light up their dwellings at night. Now they can study at night and they have cut on their energy bills.
There is no fancy development strategy concept. Just basic common sense. Just one step at a time.
Mezimbite: But don’t you have some over-arching, grandiose economic developmental implementation vision for the future? Something sweeping and lofty, that we policy wonks can write a detailed white paper about with footnotes, references, researchers and global conference panel discussions? And then go back to MIT and give a power point presentation with an overhead projector? Or, present to The Earth Institute at Columbia University? Or – how about to the esteemed, erudite French enarques at École Nationale d’Administration?
Antoine: Yes we have a vision. For example, our vision for our school in Uganda is to make it a farm, make it reach food security and then generate revenues through agriculture to become financially sustainable .
Mezimbite: Yes, but that’s just common sense once again – wrapped in a different disguise!
Tell us about this Ugandan student who wanted to learn French?
Diana taught herself French from donated books
Antoine: We received a letter from one of the school children in Uganda whom we work with.
Her name is Diana Ndagire.
We found out she was learning French, so we got her a dictionary and some old lesson books.
Diana wrote us a letter in very decent French – for a beginner. She studied it on her own – without a French teacher, on her own time. That is initiative, that is empowerment, and that is hope for the future – again, one step at a time, and one child at a time..
Mezimbite: She sounds like a smart student. Perhaps Diana has the potential to study at École Nationale d’Administration one day. How would you feel about her having such an opportunity to study abroad in Europe – or in the US? If that became possible for Diana?
Antoine: I have committed to all the students we sponsor that I will finance their studies till they are done studying as long as they get good marks; I secretly dream some of them will be so successful that I will have a chance to bring a few to the US or Europe, should they need to study a discipline that is not available in Africa – as long as they commit to going back to help develop their own country and spread the wealth themselves.
Mezimbite: Do you think this is a long term solution for Uganda and other African countries – that Western educated Africans return back home with new skills and gradually take over the role that Western aid and development agencies are playing?
Antoine: It is not the only solution, but it should be part of the solution. It does not mean either that future African leaders have to go overseas. It will just bring a better understanding between South and North, develop access to networks, create human bondings, and build a stronger dialogue between nations, because at the end of the day, in any business it comes down to personal relationships. And yes, Africa should be helped by the Africans themselves not by the Muzungus (the Kiswahili colloquialism for “white people”).
