Working Villages Blog

An interesting article on the efforts of small farmers in Haiti to prevent hybrid seeds that have been treated with toxic chemicals:

http://www.truthout.org/haitian-farmers-commit-burning-monsanto-hybrid-seeds59616

This attempted seed donation by Monsanto is unfortunately a common occurrence, which frequently results in deep debt and environmental degradation for small farmers.  One of the many reasons that we use only open-pollinated heirloom seeds and practice seed-saving, so that WVI farmers can help promote environmental sustainability for generations.

Hi everyone,

First, some exciting news: Alex was chosen to be a Rainer Arnhold Fellow!  The Rainer Arnhold Fellows organization helps social entrepreneurs grow their projects to a larger scale, and it’s a fantastic opportunity for Alex to meet development innovators from all over the world. You can check out the website at www.rainerfellows.org.

Second, we have some exciting progress from the Ruzizi Project.  Fiston has managed to make charcoal briquettes from agricultural corn waste, as shown by MIT engineer Amy Smith here at TED and here on Youtube.  These briquettes made from corn stalks burn more cleanly than firewood, which decreases the number of respiratory problems that arise from indoor cooking fires.  This also marks a tremendous step in our ongoing reforestation efforts in the Ruzizi Valley, as it will reduce the number of trees cut down for firewood.

If you would like to read the article on Working Villages in the Small Farmer’s Journal, you can check it out here: http://smallfarmersjournal.com/congo-farm-project-from-starvation-to-sustainability.  It’s a great read!

Dear friends,

I have just returned from the most productive trip to Congo I have ever had.   I am extremely excited about the coming year, and am sure that 2010 will be the year that much of the planning and work that we have been doing since 2006 finally comes together.   There is so much to tell – from the 11,000 trees WVI planted on my trip, to the huge harvests of corn and rice, to the food I ate, to the ox program, to the new corn processing center we built this month, to our guests, to our plans for the future, to the new closeness that I developed with many of the people I work with.  While I have so much to say, I fear that, if you are like me, if I make this too long no one will read it, and there are some very important things that I am excited about and would like to share with you.  So I will keep this particular update focused on the future, in particular the next 3 months.  In the next 3 months we have the ability to build a foundation that will greatly support WVI for years to come.

As I see it, our farms in Congo are like an engine of development that we have been building.  The engine has been working for the past 2 years, but working sub-optimally.  The different aspects of our work have been like pistons, and we have slowly been adding pistons since we began. At this point we have only to add one more piston, and our engine will really begin to function.  That piston is to solve WVI’s problem of crop storage.  Once we can store what we grow ourselves, and the crop surpluses of the surrounding farmers, then the greatest problem that has hindered our development will finally be solved.

To do this Fiston and I would like to finish repairing an old barn on our land that has the capacity to store between 600-700 metric tons of crops at a time.  For years we have seen tons of crops rotting because of weather damage from lack of storage, and have wanted to repair this barn, but there has always been a more pressing need to fulfill.  Now those needs are being met, and if we want to progress any further in our work then we must finish this barn.  Once we do this we will enter into a new era of our project.

We have done great deeds in Congo over the past 4 years.  We have built something that is truly unique in war-torn South Kivu, and is a wonder to behold in a land which is otherwise so destroyed by violence.  We have done so from scratch, starting with nothing, and the problems of storage that hinder us would seem absurd here in the United States.  The morale of our workers plunges when they see crops rotting in piles in the rain for lack of adequate storage.  These are crops that they worked hard to plant, weed, and harvest, and if only the crops were stored correctly then our work would move forward, and their sister or father or mother or brother could have a job too.  So I have told Fiston that by June 1, we in the US will have raised him the $20,000 that is required to finish repairing the barn.

If we can fund this barn by June 1, then it will be repaired by July 1.  And if it is ready by July 1, WVI will be in a position to not only store our own crops, but also to store the massive surpluses of corn in the region that will start to be harvested in July.  The barn will be an integral part of WVI’s next phase, which is to buy local surpluses, process them into cornmeal, and then market them with our own crops of corn.

The economist in me is truly excited at the prospect of implementing this new program.  Last year we did something similar with rice, but corn is a bigger part of the Congolese diet in South Kivu, and our potential impact on peoples’ lives is much greater.

Four things will be accomplished when we buy surplus corn from the farmers around us:

1. The farmers who sell to us will get a better price from WVI than they do from the war profiteers they currently sell to.

2. The people who buy the cornmeal will get a cheaper, more stable food supply. Right now, speculators purchase the corn and hold it until the price increases to 2 or sometimes 3 times its originally inflated price.

3. WVI will get a larger market base that will allow us to sell our future surpluses with more ease and surety of price.

4. WVI will get a stable source of non-US-fundraising-based revenue.

This last point is no small thing.  Last year we did the same thing with rice.  The profits from that program allowed us to invest $127,000 in capital improvements in Congo, such as buying a corn flour mill, two corn kernel removing machines, a 24kw generator, and welding equipment.   We were also able to build – just this month – a new corn storage and milling facility, with capacity for 100 metric tons.  And, most importantly, we more than doubled the size of our own farms from 100 acres to 250 acres, all cleared and irrigated.  In all, the project provided an average of $10,000 per month that I didn’t have to raise in the US!  With the corn program we hope to double that amount of money this year.  Then we can put those profits into our farm project to make it more productive and efficient, so that it not only pays the wages of our workers, but also generates profits strong enough to help fund other aspects of our work, such as housing construction.

Finally, with the corn project, WVI will be able to do something we have wanted to do for quite some time: sell our surpluses directly to the end buyer, instead of middleman wholesalers in the city of Bukavu.  To this end, this month WVI is setting up 3 retail stores for the sale of our surpluses, one in Luvungi and two in Bukavu.  The two stores in Bukavu are to be managed by my translator and good friend Blaise, who has recently been convinced to close the store he runs in the city of Uvira and move to Bukavu (with his new wife) to manage the selling of our rice and corn.  These stores will be something new for WVI and for the people in Bukavu, as they will provide stably priced, affordable crops throughout the year.

We have done a lot of work in mapping out and preparing for this final stage.  Now the pieces are all in place, and we are ready to move.

Thank you all very much for your help and support over the past 4 years.  May we have many more productive and bright years together to come!

Alex

Hi everyone,

Another depressing but important article in the New York Times by Nicholas Kristof http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/07/opinion/07kristof.html.  Hopefully his coverage will raise awareness so that more people will see the need to end the cycle of violence that Congo has been in for over a decade.  Intervention is necessary, but it’s not enough – people need to be building productive lives so they don’t fall immediately back into violence as they have done in Congo again and again.  The faster WVI can grow, the fewer people will suffer like Jeanne in this article.

Hi everyone,

Here’s a link to an op-ed piece about DR Congo in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/opinion/31kristof.html

A discouraging article, but it emphasizes the importance of the Ruzizi Project.  Building a sustainable path to peace is vital, and desperately needed!  Working Villages is creating the only oasis of hope in this devastated region, and the faster we can grow, the fewer people will suffer at the hands of the desperate and power-hungry.  I hope Kristof’s series of articles can help bring attention to this humanitarian catastrophe, and the need for intervention and peace.

Happy New Year!

Well, we’ve started the year off with a big pile of snow up here in Maine, but it hasn’t slowed us down – things are already heating up for WVI in 2010!  A lot has happened since the beginning of the new year, and it looks like we’ll stay busy through the spring.

The biggest news is that we just partnered with Zerofootprint to start a big tree-planting project in the Ruzizi Valley.  In February, we’ll be planting 23,000 trees in the Ruzizi Valley.  Most of the trees that used to grow throughout the valley were destroyed in the conflicts over the past decade, and having new growth is an important step towards peace and stability.  This is a fantastic way to kick off our reforestation efforts in the new year, and will have a positive effect on the local soil and water table as well.  It’s an exciting project, and will only be more so with time.

Alex will be busy throughout the spring as well, going first to a TED conference in Long Beach, and then to Congo at the end of February.  It looks to be a fascinating conference, and, as always, should make some very thought-provoking videos.  Directly after that, Alex will head to the Ruzizi Valley Project with several guests from TED.  This is the first time that anyone will be staying in the new houses at Itara, so it will be very exciting to hear how everyone makes out!

Aside from that, the Ruzizi Valley Project has had a strong start in 2010; we have some new photos up at community webshots, including pictures of the truck in action.  As you can see from the photos, the truck has already proved its worth many times over, and we’re very grateful to have it.

We’ll keep you posted as things progress – stay warm!

Cheers,

Laura

Hi everyone,

Just a quick announcement – Alex has been chosen as a TED Senior Fellow!  Out of the 65 TED Fellows who spoke at TED conferences this past summer, 20 were chosen to be Senior Fellows.

“This group is especially important to us, as they pioneered the Fellows program,” said Tom Rielly, TED Fellows Director. “We look forward to helping them grow as leaders, and to assisting them to further their important work.”

Alex is extremely excited to continue his association with this elite international organization of innovators.  If you’re in the area, please feel free to come see him tonight at the Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick at 7pm.  He’ll be talking about community sustainability and post-petroleum as we head further into the 21st century – and I’m sure he’ll answer questions about TED too!

Cheers,
Laura

Hello all,

Well, it’s actually happened, and we’re almost at the end of 2009. What a year! We have had unprecedented growth, and feel very grateful as we enter this season of giving thanks.

For those of you who missed Alex’s presentation at the Frontier Café, you can catch him giving a talk for Transition Towns at the Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick at 7pm on Tuesday, December 1st. The focus will be on community sustainability and post-petroleum as we head further into the 21st century.

Many of you have already received the annual holiday mailing, but for those of you who are primarily online supporters, here it is – our year in review!

2009 – A Year of Expansion

2009 has marked substantial growth for Working Villages International, both in terms of outreach and in terms of program development at our Ruzizi Valley Project in the Democratic Republic of Congo. We feel very fortunate as we look back over the past year.

The year started off with a bang, as we were able to fulfill the generosity of numerous donors and put our new rice huller into full production. The rice huller can process over 160 tons of rice a month, which enabled us to process not only our own rice, but also the rice of several thousand small farmers in the surrounding area. This had a dramatic effect, as the farmers were now being paid significantly more for their rice. Since farmers are now guaranteed a good value, more people are growing rice.

The importance of increased rice production became clear this year when a white fly infestation came through central Africa and destroyed the cassava crop, an important staple of the local diet. In the past, such blights have caused widespread starvation, but our rice program meant that local farmers produced enough rice to prevent famine in our area. Our Project Manager, Fiston Malago, is now growing various resistant strains of cassava. In the meantime, our program has ensured that the people of the Ruzizi Valley have a stable source of food.

Our agricultural production has exploded this year, from about 50,000 pounds of rice per month in January to about 100,000 pounds of rice per month in August. In August we also harvested 220,000 pounds of corn, and large amounts of seasonal produce such as cabbage, beans, melon, squash, eggplant, cucumber, lemons, tomatoes, lettuce, and onions. Our staff has stayed at about 600 people since 2008, but our crop production has greatly increased. We are producing more than twice as much food as last year because the labor originally used for infrastructure improvements, such as clearing fields and digging irrigation, is now focused on crop production. The massive food surplus and our large staff have both acted as stabilizing forces in the region, as there is now a consistent source of both food and work.

One of the most exciting projects of 2009 came as a byproduct of our rice production. The small husk around each grain of rice is inedible, and difficult to compost or burn. We were able to obtain a design for a rice hull stove which would burn the hulls by creating an intense updraft. During our summer trip to the Ruzizi Project, WVI’s blacksmiths expertly built a rice hull stove, and everyone cheered as the previously incombustible rice hulls burst into flame and boiled a pot of water. This stove will have a dramatic effect on our reforestation efforts in the valley, by reducing the need for firewood in cookfires. By the time we left, Hortense and Toiye, two of the ladies in the kitchen, were already making delicious meals with the new stove.

The July trip to Congo was a success on many fronts. Alex was able to oversee the ox training, and the animals had their first session in a yoke. Our staff teamsters, Toiye and Live, were calm and masterful with the animals, and it was clear by the time we left that the oxen could be plowing as soon as we can obtain suitable equipment. This was exciting progress, as animal traction will be an important component in the next stage of village development. Toiye has been with WVI since we first started working in the Ruzizi Valley, and she is now not only an amazing cook but also an amazing teamster!

Alex was extremely busy all summer and was in high demand both in the states and abroad. He was chosen to be a TEDGlobal Fellow, which meant speaking at the July 2009 TEDGlobal Conference at Oxford. TED is an elite international organization of innovators and entrepreneurs, and it was a huge honor for Alex to be at this convention with such luminaries as Stephen Fry and Gordon Brown. After his talk at Oxford, he stopped for a day or two in Maine to speak at the Greaterthan>Conference in Portland before flying to California for a series of engagements in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara. He made his way to Washington DC and New York before finally returning to Maine for the 2009 Common Ground Fair in Unity.

As we head into 2010, Working Villages has never been so strong. Thanks to the generosity of donors all over the world, in September we were able to raise enough money to buy a truck for the Ruzizi Project. This will allow our staff to transport significantly more grains and agricultural produce, eliminating crop waste and providing more food for the region. 2009 also marked an important milestone for us, as the first year that our agricultural surpluses provided enough money to pay all the monthly wages for our agricultural workers. This is a very important step forward, as it allows us to redirect our funding to the next phase of development: buildings and infrastructure construction.

This summer we completed several beautiful model houses, made of brick, tile and thatch. The houses have been a big success, and there is a big demand in the valley for more building. But there is a challenge which is currently keeping us from increasing our rate of construction: with gasoline at $12 per gallon, the cost of transporting materials from outside vendors quickly mounts up.

Our next goal, therefore, is to raise money to build kilns for brick, mortar and lime. With the cost of transportation eliminated, the kilns will enable us to produce beautiful and long-lasting buildings using local clay, sand, and lime for less than $1000 apiece. The construction of houses, barns and infrastructure will serve two purposes: not only will it provide badly needed buildings, but it will also create jobs and skilled job training in an area that has been ravaged by war. Job creation is fundamental to building more stability in the region, and we look forward to 2010 as a time when we will take some very important steps in building our village of peace.

If you would like to help us in this next step, we appreciate contributions of any size. You can make a secure online donation here, or, if you would like to make a seasonal Gift of Peace donation in honor of a friend, you can download our Gift of Peace form here (right click). Thank you so much for your support over the past year, and have a wonderful holiday season!

Cheers,

Laura

Hi everyone!

A quick announcement for all our New England supporters: on Tuesday November 3rd at 7:30 pm, Alex will be giving a slideshow presentation called "Building a Village of Hope: Bringing Sustainable Peace to the Democratic Republic of Congo" at the Frontier Cafe in the Fort Andross Mill in Brunswick.  The event will be co-sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee, Maine; Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space; PeaceWorks; Veterans for Peace; and the Women’s International League for Peace & Freedom.

The presentation will show some of the recent accomplishments of WVI as well as where the project is heading in the near future.  As many of you know, this is a turbulent time in DR Congo, and this is a good chance to get a picture of how things are on the ground.  So, after you vote, please head on up to Brunswick and enjoy a fantastic presentation in an exciting new venue!  The website for the Frontier Cafe is www.explorefrontier.com if you’d like to check that out.  The suggested donation is $10, but the most important thing is that we’d love to see you there.  If you have any questions, as always feel free to give me a call.

Cheers,
Laura

207-607-1367
kahnwvi@gmail.com