Appeal for Longford support to help people of Malawi after devastation of Cyclone Idai

Self Help Africa is calling on it's supporters and everyone that can in Longford to support our new emergency campaign appeal for help after the devastation of Cyclone Idai in southern Africa. The death toll from the huge cyclone Idai that hit Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe is now close to 1,000 people and children. Many more are missing, while tens of thousands are stranded, cut off from roads, electricity and clean drinking water in mainly poor, rural areas.

The cyclone has affected more than 2.5 million people in the three southern African countries, according to government officials. The port city of Beira in Mozambique was hit the hardest, with the airport closed, electricity cut and many homes destroyed. The storm hit Beira and moved west into Zimbabwe and Malawi, affecting thousands more.

Close on a million people of Malawi’s population need emergency food and shelter assistance immediately. Prior to this crisis, Malawi faced significant challenges. Average life expectancy is just 58 years and three quarters of the population living on less than a Euro a day. It’s the sixth poorest country in the world and Cyclone Idai has brought further suffering to communities that are poorly equipped to deal with it.

Floods and high winds have devastated homes, schools, businesses, crops, rural and farming communities, hospitals and communication stations. Thousands of people who were marooned by the heavy flooding abandoned their homes and possessions to seek safety on higher ground. Over a million people are in need of help. Families are being forced to eat meals of leaves and what little else they can find.  

In addition to this devastating cyclone, they are faced daily with endemic poverty and chronic hunger. The HIV/AIDS epidemic that swept through sub-Saharan Africa in the 1990s hit Malawi particularly hard. Out of a population of 14 million people, about a million people are currently live with the condition.

It is the kind of crushing poverty that most of us can barely imagine.  But to witness it first hand, as I did recently, is almost enough to make you weep. Taken together, the problems can seem insurmountable but today this challenge is especially compelling because we know we have the capacity to make a difference.

The organisation I work for, Self Help Africa has been working in Malawi for decades, focused on agricultural production, HIV/AIDS, nutrition, livelihoods, food and education. All our efforts are aimed at breaking the cycle of poverty, giving opportunities to communities that otherwise may not have them.

By building on past progress, we can create new opportunity for impoverished communities, although emergencies like Cyclone Idai pose great challenges. Our work brings hope - the promise that, with shared sacrifice, quality emergency responses, wise investment, and renewed commitment, we can reduce substantially the levels of poverty, hunger, and deprivation and give hope to countries like Malawi and southern countries in Africa in their hour of need. 

This has been our focus in Self Help Africa - to reduce levels of poverty and hunger by focusing on agriculture, education, livelihoods, climate change alleviation, the credit union and co-op system, entrepreneurial advancement, the empowerment of women and, in recent years, emergency responses. And now we are asking for your help and support to join with us to help communities in Malawi cope with this new challenge. This is not a time for talk but for active and genuine commitment to help and support the people and children affected by Cyclone Idai. 

There are, of course, many other urgent challenges for society - such as homelessness. Our world is hurting, shaken by corporate misconduct and greed, and its impact on workers and investors, as well as the broader forces of globalization, economic change and all too evident examples of climate change.

More than half of the world's population lives on less than two euros a day. Almost 1 billion people across the globe, most of them children, live with hunger, malnutrition and the effects of climate change. These numbers should not immobilise us. They should call us to reflection and action. And we need this mobilisation and action now for the suffering people of Malawi.

This is not one more thing to feel bad about, but rather an opportunity to put our care for humanity into action, to be the carer’s in society, to lift up the virtues and ethical principles that enhance human dignity. We can make a difference if we mobilise to combat poverty, because we have done so in the past. There is reason for hope and no excuse for inaction. 

We’re asking for your help so that together, we can alleviate suffering in Malawi, where we’ve teamed up with local organisations to provide relief to thousands of families affected by this disaster. While coastal Mozambique has to this point borne the brunt of the catastrophe, over 100,000 households in Malawi have been left homeless by the storm and consequent flooding. 

Cyclone Idai has already killed hundreds, and flash flooding and rising water levels are putting even more lives at risk. Self Help Africa have been working with small farmers in Malawi for many years and we are now responding to this crisis at a local level. More than 162,000 households are in dire need of assistance. Flooded lands and ruined harvests mean that food security is an imminent problem facing many families across the region, as is shelter and a lack of clean drinking water.

 If you would to help these families affected by this tragedy please visit our website at www.selfhelpafrica.org

I've spent over 25 years living in Africa and Asia. I'm quite proud to say, I work for an Irish development organisation supported and funded by Irish Aid and the Irish public. It’s an organization that is dedicated to empowering rural communities across Africa to achieve economic independence.

A good example of this work is a program I visited in Balaka, Malawi that is designed to help a village diversify the crops it grows, moving from simply growing crops to eat to also sowing some alternative crops that can be sold for profit. One family I visited had received a loan of three types of seeds, and a crash course on crop diversification. To discharge their debt, the family simply had to pass on the first excess of crops and seeds to two other families, who signed up for the same deal. Any crops that came along after that were theirs, adding extra crops that they could sell and make an extra income as well as more food for the family. 

Meanwhile, peanut farming, a cash crop well matched to both climate and market conditions, was introduced into the village for the first time. Properly bagged nuts are largely non-perishable, travel well, and do not have to be sold at peak harvest time, so they can be held back until better prices can be obtained. Program participants, who are treated like businessmen and not beneficiaries, pay for their initial seed stock and training by returning seeds the next season.

How do we in Self Help Africa know when it has succeeded? We know, when we can move on to the next village with a fresh load of seeds, crops and even poultry and animals, leaving profitable businesses behind.  Broader initiatives include training programs to help turn small scale agribusinesses into investable enterprises that can attract outside capital and generate real economic growth - the basis for much of our success here in Ireland.

We would like to get to the point where we are not just asking people for charitable donations. We would love to be pitching people for their investment euros. Africa is not just a continent of need; it is a continent of opportunity.

Though I saw much tragedy, sadness and suffering on my last trip to Malawi, I also met some truly beautiful people – all of them friendly and welcoming. I came away feeling blessed to have met them and as though I was the one being helped, not the other way round.

By an accident of birth I am Irish, but I could have just as easily been Malawian. My trips to Malawi and indeed many of the other African countries I have lived and worked in have made me realize the numerous similarities there are between us all. We breathe the same air. We walk the same way. Our spirits need love and acceptance. Our bodies need food, water and sleep. We share the same humanity. We are really not so different. 

My lasting impression of Malawi during my last visit was not the scale of its poverty, but the spirit of its people. Drought, climate change, hunger and physical suffering have not stolen their hope. They remain joyful when they have every reason to be depressed. You can hear hope in their songs:  ‘The Lord will bless someone today. It may be you. It may be me. It may be someone by your side’. 

My thoughts often go back to the beautiful children I saw at the Self Help Africa projects I visited, where knowledge is being passed on by local staff that will vastly improve their lives for the better.  It brings me great comfort to know that these children will have the opportunity to grow up, thanks to your support.

Children are a precious human resource and it is in children that any country has its future. As the saying goes, ‘A forest without young trees today will never be a forest tomorrow’. It is imperative that children born today in Malawi must not only just survive, but are able to grow and develop to their fullest potential in order for the nation to prosper.

The work that Self Help Africa does in Malawi with your help, may seem like a drop in the ocean, but many drops make an ocean and Self Help Africa will continue to do what we can to help the rural farmer, both men and women and their families and especially people and families affected by Cyclone Idai.

 
If you would like to make a donation, get involved in an event or to organise an event to help us with our appeal for helping people, children and families in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai or just find out some more information about the work of Self Help Africa, you can do so by phoning (01) 6778880, visiting www.selfhelpafrica.org or simply send whatever you can afford to Self Help Africa, Westside Resource Centre, Seamus Quirke Road, Westside, Galway or drop me a line at ronan.scully@selfhelpafrica.org