May 2022Visit
Information on this year's visit can be found in the Pages:
Home and Our Work.
July 2019 Visit
Whose Journey Is it?
A metaphor, Whose Journey Is It?”, created by our Malawi consultant, Feston Pangani, underscores our goal to develop the self-sufficiency of community-based organizations (CBOs). It goes: A woman is traveling to a market some distance away. She begins her walk and shortly a fellow villager comes by on a bike and offers a ride. After moving for a short time, he says he forgot some papers and must return home. She stands on the road. What does she do, keep walking toward the market or wait for the bicyclist to return so she can continue her journey?
These issues of ownership of a CBO and community participation were emphasized by Orphan Support Africa from its first contacts with CBOs in 2005 and continues with VOCA-US that has provided sixteen grants to twelve groups since 2016. Nine CBOs continue their work to become self-sufficient with their income generating activities, but three have been unsuccessful. Those no longer receive funds, but we are excited by the prospects of three new partners added this last year.
What are the factors that make a CBO a success, and conversely what accounts for a failure? Through the years from 2005 two elements appear repeatedly, as they did recently in July with eight visits with CBOs: Active community participation with support by leadership. With these communities see themselves as the owners of the CBO. Without these factors, CBOs are likely to fail and lose prospects for VOCA grants in the future.
In traveling around Malawi, groups praise VOCA-US for its continuing belief in them. Grants, even small ones like VOCA’s, are scarce and they are happy that visitors come so far to see them and to monitor their grants. In the US, too, people praise our efforts that provide funds and our annual trips to monitor the grants. Kudos are always welcomed, but the response is the same for both Malawians and friends at home: “Praise the CBO”. They collectively do the work. Without that participation to implement each grant, the community would not own the CBO and be able to help their orphans and vulnerable children. So,
Whose journey is it?
Kids at Twavwane CBO, Chitipa District—a new partner with VOCA
NEWS 2017
April Board Visit to Malawi By Mike Hill VOCA Board Member (May 2017)
“I fell in love with Malawi all over again"
“The … projects give the communities ownership.”
“…a transformative experience”.
“[CBO] projects demonstrate an ability to become self-sustaining so that the funds generated by the projects themselves keep orphans and vulnerable children in school”
There were seven of us, herded with aplomb by Feston, our VOCA Malawian consultant, through quite a vast, dusty and sometimes hot landscape. All of us traveled for a week and saw two Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) in the southern region of Malawi. Four, traveled two weeks and saw eight CBOs from north to south. Then, Feston and I continuing with four more visits. In all, twelve community groups were interviewed, but the results merit some excitement and a reasonable amount of pride. In 2006, a failure rate of 25% was forecasted in Orphan Support Africa's (OSA) Gates Foundation grant. Over three weeks, we found only two of the twelve CBOs that were not operative. That result occurred in one of the poorest countries in the World. With meager resources in its villages, Malawians are sustaining their projects that generate income for the poorest in their communities: vulnerable children (VC), the elderly and chronically ill. Gained against long odds, these “findings” are terrific results—and staggeringly good to those of us who have supported OSA and now VOCA over the past twelve years. Please read below the responses of two in our party, Garry Prime and Zilah Mendoza Hill, for personal glimpses into our travel. And stay in touch for a short video made during the trip that is being produced.
Next? A return trip, of course. In a year a better survey tool will hopefully tease out the factors that drive a CBO towards sustainability and the desired outcome: to provide resources, sourced locally, for the care of its most vulnerable—a big, dare I say HUGE, goal for Malawians. In small steps, can a CBO become self-sustainable or will it always need some outside support? Without pretense of being “research”, the survey’s purpose will be to learn what sustainability factors can help CBOs empower their support of VC. Such factors could be community participation, a sense of community ownership of the CBO, effective application of skills learned, food security, project oversight by the VCs’ guardians…. We’ll ask CBOs about factors the contributed to their successes or failures. This will entail travel for one to two months from the extreme south in Nsanje to the extreme north in Chitepa. Can’t wait to go.
OSA’s—and now VOCA’s—tag line is: “restoring children’s futures through community empowerment”. It’s a constant reminder for us that success is achieved by the communities and their CBOs, and not by VOCA, whose role is to be a catalyst, a resource, an occasional consultant and a constant cheerleader. Keep visiting us here for updates.
By Zilah Mendoza Hill, OSA Board Member (May 2017)
“Zomba!” A word I have heard over 10 years expressed with such an enthusiasm that I could hardly begin to imagine the impact on my father, who picked up in 2005 and left the States to begin residency in Malawi. The grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that Orphan Support Africa (OSA) received far exceeded the expectations I had for the humanitarian work that he and his friends had been chipping away at since 1993. At that time the passion project, Malawi Children’s Village, was still a dream beginning to manifest itself on the dinning room table in the form of pink donation cards. I knew something special was happening but to realize the dream is something very different.
MCV births OSA is followed by VOCA.
I am back in the hustle of Los Angeles and for days words have been lost to me. Now I can reflect on the gift of understanding more clearly the power of “paying it forward.” I visited two communities near Zomba, the southern region of Malawi, Chilungamo and Masangamo. Their emphasis is the pass-on project. In theory it’s simple. Provide a community with a goat or a pig by gifting the livestock in the name of the orphan to the family who has been caring for that orphan. When there is off spring “pass it on” to the next child that has been identified. In farm country the benefits are far reaching. The pass-on project has provided a safety net for hundreds of children. The money that this brings is significant in a country where the median annual income is two hundred and sixty dollars a year. “Why then don’t we just give them some money directly?” After sitting in with CBO’s (Community Based Organization) and listening during community meetings I came to understand that the pass-on project came at their request and in most cases has been hugely successful when administered by the community itself. The pass-on projects give the communities ownership. They can control how the livestock is raised to whom and when to pass offspring, when to take animals to market and where and how the money is spent over time. The leaders in the villages understand that empowering their communities is bottom line.
With 12 CBO’s working hard supporting 280 Villages and 8,781 identified Orphans/Vulnerable Children there is so much more that goes into understanding the complexities of the work that VOCA is doing to help instill economic stability. Each CBO is unique and the needs are varied. Some require maize mills and education on sustaining the mill, some lack materials for rebuilding their piggery, others are growing by continuing the pass-on project.
This is my second visit to Malawi. My first visit in 2004 was spent entirely in the Mangochi District where the Nkata CBO is located. I know first hand that hundreds of young people have been afforded access to secondary school, basic clothing, food and when needed medicines. I believe that the many years that my father, Michael, his friends Garry, Traz and Feston [VOCA’s Malawi consultant] have spent working together with the different CBO’s in Malawi is creating more global awareness and a higher value system. The average life expectancy in Malawi has increased from an average of 39 years in 2004 to 50 years. Access to antiretroviral (ARV) medication for those living with AIDS has been made available when there was no access to AIDS medication on my first visit in 2004, and many more vulnerable children are receiving the support they need. I point to VOCA as being responsible for a part of this positive growth.
(May 2017) By Garry Prime, VOCA Board Member
The trip was great and Traz "fell in love with Malawi all over again"... she even still likes me...I think!
From a business point of view it is easy to understand success and failure. New business start-ups are always subject to failure. "Murphy" is always lurking in the background to throw a curve ball and upset the best of plans. In addition to "Murphy" education is a constant that needs a solid footing in any venture.
If we look at CBO's (community-base organizations) as business start-ups we must accept the possibility of failure or perhaps limited success as a given....not 100% will fail...but some will. This is a "GIVEN"!
Murphy comes to Malawi in many forms, different from those we see connected to business failure in the USA, but none less impactful. Good examples in Malawi are floods that wipe out facilities, Swine flu that wipes our entire pig populations and in the education arena, lack of understanding that a maize mill is not going to run forever without spare parts and service!
Back in the day when I was a teacher in Malawi my kids had no knowledge of how a motorcycle worked, what internal combustion was, the role played by oil and gas, the fact that tires did not last forever...all stuff we knew thru osmosis and living in "our world". What my kids did know was that every year there was the potential of NJALA, “starvation season”, and that maize needed to be planted just prior to the "real rains". They knew that bananas had no seeds and there was no fertilization that happened in that banana tree....they knew that Vimbuza could cure all sorts of mental disorders and they knew that the old crone medicine lady could cure "stuff" with natural plants and she knew which plants helped what ailment! They knew it all by osmosis and I was stunned and amazed!
Clearly the education process is not done at the VOCA projects, but what is impressive is the progress to date.
No two CBO's are the same...but there were some consistent components that point to success and lack of success. Those things needed are good management, commitment, selflessness (focus on vulnerable children) and a fair dose of good luck!
The big money is gone, but it is evident that more inputs, more education and a little more support could show big gains.
Agreed, it was a great trip!