Child Legacy International
2020 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the purchase of materials to install an irrigation system for Macadamia Tree Farm in Lilongwe.
Gary Robertson, Operations Director with Child Legacy International (CSI), explained the project was to implement a prototypical drip irrigation for its 1950 Macadamia trees. In a collaborative approach, CSI provided 70% of the project funding, FOMA provided 28%, Working with Water pumps and Other Tools for Africa (WOTA) provided logistical and specialist support and the community contributed in the form of labour. The main aim of the project was to ensure all macadamia trees have efficient, less labour intensive and affordable irrigation and also for 10 farmer clubs (15 members each) to be trained in installation of irrigation systems.
Kachindamoto Community Development
2020 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the purchase of building materials to help the construction of a visitor shelter at the Kachindamoto Health Centre.
Abraham Kathako, working with Kachindamoto Community Development Organisation wrote to us to say, ‘on behalf of Traditional Authority Kachindamoto and the Kachindamoto Community in Dedza district, we would like to thank FOMA for the financial support for the construction of a guardian shelter. This shelter has been very important and has helped us in many ways especially children, the elderly and women to be able to access health services in a decent and protected manner especially during windy, rainy or very sunny seasons’.
The community worked together to provide bricks, sand and unskilled labour towards the construction of the shelter as well as contributing donations towards paying for transport for the construction materials to be delivered.
Starfish Malawi
2021 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the construction of a toilet block for at the special needs resource centre, Salima.
Mark Aldrich, Trusts Manger at Starfish Malawi described the aim of the Special Educational Needs Project as helping to enhance the welfare and education of children who have disabilities. These children often fail to achieve in mainstream education because the large class sizes in Malawian schools do not allow the teacher to assist disabled children as they need. The buildings themselves are not disability-friendly prevent access to teaching.
Peter Bell, Head of Fundraising at Starfish Malawi reported that the new latrines, funded by FOMA,
will be of a long drop construction with two cubicles for boys and two for girls. Crucially however the toilets will have disabled access and wider doors for wheelchairs. The new toilets are part of a larger construction project at the Everland Special Educational Needs Resource Centre sponsored by the Michael Jackson Legacy Foundation.
Standing Voice
2021 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the purchase of ipads to enable the use of the CommCare system in the albino skin cancer prevention clinics.
Emily Spence, Programs Manager with Standing Voice explained that since 2016, Standing Voice has built an outreach programme of comprehensive dermatological healthcare for people with albinism in Malawi, which now has over 700 patients enrolled across 5 districts. In 2020, we began preparing to implement a new electronic data collection system (CommCare), to be used in our Skin Cancer Prevention Programme (SCPP). The new patient management system will facilitate data entry at our clinics and ultimately improve our quality of care by allowing us to monitor patients’ skin health over time, tailor our services to individual needs, and identify broad trends in patient data.
We are very grateful to the Friends of Malawi Association for supporting Standing Voice in the roll out of the new data collection system to better monitor health outcomes and ensure high-quality care for people with albinism for years to come.
Bob Kubwenza, Dermatology Officer with Standing Voice said “The introduction of the new database has made our job much simpler. Using the tablets is fast, so I was able to see many more patients at the clinic compared with when we were using paper questionnaires. CommCare has helped ensure clinicians are very thorough when conducting full body examinations, by making sure we do not miss any body parts out. Patients are no longer complaining of long waiting times as the process is much faster for them, including the distribution of sun protective items.”
2020 Project Summary
A grant of £1150 to support the creation & distribution of skin care packages to people with albinism in Malawi.
Emily Spence, Program Manager with Standing Voice reported that the regulations imposed by the Malawian government in response to COVID-19 and the need to safeguard patients from the virus meant we were unable to deliver our skin cancer clinics and training programme as usual. Therefore an alternative means to providing support for the 531 registered patients began with distributing of emergency skin care packages including sunscreen, health information booklets and, where necessary, hygiene kits (masks, soap and sanitary products for women). 43 visits to health centres over 5 districts were conducted, limiting patient numbers to facilitate social distancing, and helping patients avoid public transport by holding clinics nearer their communities. Community dermatologists trained by Standing Voice undertook comprehensive clinical examinations on all patients, referring those in need of more advanced treatment.
We are very grateful to the Friends of Malawi Association for supporting Standing Voice to provide life-saving care to people with albinism during this difficult period.
STRADE
2021 Project Summary
A grant of £875 to support an Irrigation Scheme through installation of a solar water pump for the Chambo Community, Mzimba District.
Masida Hastings Ziba, Director at STRADE, said that following the success of the previous project with FOMA (see below), the community agreed they would like to scale up the economic aspect of the farming by creating a Community Irrigation Scheme. A modern solar pump will allow growing of additional vegetables and crops like maize, beans and sweet potatoes to improve food security for over 500 households – approximately 2500 people.
Masida further reported a case study of ‘Esther’ a 35 year old farmer. In 2021, she harvested 1000 kg of maize having used organic manure and irrigation. She kept 400 kg to feed her family of 7 but was able to sell 600 kg, enabling her to meet basic needs such as paying school fees. She also made a total of MK60,000 from vegetable sales that enabled her to buy a bed, soap, sugar and other food to supplement her meals.
2020 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the construction of two shallow wells with hand pumps in Madang’ombe Village, Chambo, Mzimba District.
Masida Hastings Ziba, Director at STRADE, said that in this area water is drawn from hand-dug small holes close to the homestead. People drinking this contaminated water makes them prone to waterborne disease and no organisation has attempted to address this problem. Therefore, STRADE, in its work with the community assisted by applying for a FOMA grant to construct shallow protected wells to improve the quality of water supply. The community assisted in the project by providing fired burnt bricks, river sand and quarry stone.
Joyful Motherhood
2022 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the purchase of a motorbike to enable home heath visits conducted by the Chimwemwe m’ubereki Association (also known as Joyful Motherhood).
Glory Mwafulirwa-Kabaghe, Programme Manager with Joyful Motherhood explained that vulnerable infants and post-partum mothers are referred to the programme immediately after birth and the service then provides home-based nursing care for at least one year. Vulnerable babies are identified as those whose mothers die soon after delivery, premature infants, low birth weight, twins and triplets, babies with disabilities such and babies whose mothers have no breast milk. Vulnerable mothers are those who require extended hospitalisation after delivery or any intensive care unit admission due to obstetric incidents such as ruptured uterus, severe post-partum haemorrhage, eclampsia, septicaemia, emergency hysterectomy, severe anaemia, post-natal, depression/psychosis and teenage mothers less than 15 years of age.
For the home-visits to succeed, there is a need for better transportation of the staff to and from the beneficiaries’ homes and therefore it was decided to purchase a motorbike. In the first few weeks of use, the motorbike travelled over 100kms helping to conduct 23 visits to babies and 3 visits to mothers.
SEED Malawi
2021 Project Summary
A grant of £1500 to support the building of a classroom block at Mambala School, Thyolo District.
Rebecca Warner, Founder of SEED Malawi, explained that they consulted extensively with local community leaders about what the community would value most and what would have the biggest impact in improving the quality of education in the area. Currently many pupils are being taught outside underneath a tree which means that pupils’ education is subject to disruption and a lack of resources. A classroom block was felt to be vital for ensuring that pupils can be taught throughout the whole academic year, regardless of the weather.
2020 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the construction of a school classroom block at Namachila Primary School, Thyolo District.
Rebecca Warner, Founder of SEED Malawi, explained that at Namachila, a school of approximately 1600 students, there is a high drop-out rate with only 44% of boys and 45% of girls completing their schooling. This is down to many reasons including poverty (lack of resources to travel to school and pay fee), having to engage in manual labour to support the family, teenage pregnancy and illness (mainly malaria). In addition, many pupils are taught outside due to a lack of safe infrastructure meaning there is low quality of education and inconsistency of provision as school is often closed in bad weather.
Reporting on the project after it was finished, Rebecca said a sample of pupils and teachers completed a survey on how this classroom build has impacted their community. 100% of pupils interviewed said that now they are being taught in a classroom, they feel more empowered, valued and safe. 100% of teachers said that the classroom build had improved the quality of teaching and the quality of life of the children who attend the school. Attendance figures at the school have already increased since the classroom build
Namwera AIDS Coordinating Committee (NACC)
2021 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support the building of a classroom block at Namalimwe, Makupo Village, Mangochi.
George Chiweyu from NACC described the main goal of the project as improving the developmental outcomes of 200 young, vulnerable children (including those affected by HIV/AIDS) by providing a more conducive learning environment with better education activities. The community provided baked bricks, land, water, sand and labour. They also developed plans for maintenance of the building to secure its future.
SeedSowers Trust
2025 project
A grant of £825 to support the installation of replacement water pipes, as part of the Kudyere Project, to deliver mountain spring water to communities in Mulanje, following damage as a result of Cyclone Freddy.
Mike Ansell from SeedSowers Trust, reported in the area where the water pipes were damaged are many small holder tea plantations owned and cultivated by the local villagers, were without water meaning the women and girls had to walk many miles to fetch water from far away boreholes. This meant a loss of time for tending their crops and the girls especially lost out on schooling.
The FOMA grant supported the installation of new pipes that are now bringing clean spring water to the villages.
2022 Flood relief
Mike Ansell from SeedSowers Trust, reported that Cyclone Ana in January 2022 caused much damage to crops and housing, especially in the poorer rural villages of Chilaweni, Blantyre District where SeedSowers runs a borehole programme. Work on the drilling programme had to be put on hold due the extensive flooding which damaged homes and wiped out crops. As part of the Flood Relief efforts, FOMA provided funding of £1500 to help reinstate safe water boreholes.
Tingathe Development Forum (TIDEF)
2022 Project Summary
A grant of £1000 to support purchasing and installing cassava processing machinery for Kasangadzi Community in Nkhotakota.
Hussein Chipala, Executive Director at TIDEF, said that the Kasangadzi community depend on cassava farming for income and had been badly affected by the covid pandemic preventing sales at market. The cassava farmers decided there should be a better way of storing the crop and developing other products for sale. They have formed a cooperative and will process cassava into different highly demanded products such as cassava flour which is used for baking bread, doughnuts, cakes and biscuits making. Fermented cassava is also used in restaurants and local markets for making Malawian staple food called nsima and finally animal feeds called cassava pellets. The community worked together to construct a warehouse for the machinery to be used in and attended training to use the machines.