Dear Donor,

I'm happy to report to you the progress made on the Reintegration project.  Clearing the land has been the hardest part of getting the farm ready! 

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

• Hired work force of 20 men from neighboring towns in little Bassa, these men were paid per day to brush the 2 acres farm land. The brushing and felling of trees started Jan 6 and ended on the 11, 2015. After 14 days, the brushed bush was ready to be burned, on Jan 28.
• Hired 10 men to burn the farm and after 5 days the land was ready for de-stumping and clearing.
• The planting started on Feb 18 and ended on 27, 2015. We hired 8 women of Little Bassa, who planted the cassava and corn on the 2 acres of Land for7 days.

CHALLENGES

• Power Saw Chain- The lack of power saw chain caused us to spent more money as it was not stipulated in the budget. We had to rent power saw chain to cut bigger stumps for total clearing of the site.
• Dwelling Place – the lack of dwelling place during our stay in Little Bassa, makes our stay uncomfortable until we return to our individual homes.
• Work Force – It was extremely difficult to organize a committed workforce in Little Bassa, because majority of the youth focus on fishing, we have to go into surrounding villages to organize a dedicated workforce.

CONCLUSION

The beginning of the BRV project was really a lesson and a success. We are happy that we were able to prepare the land for farming which of course we have already planted cassava and corn as start-up crops on the BRV. We are also grateful to Action10 for her continuous support in helping IDEFOCS achieve some of her many goals. As we move forward with the BRV, we anticipate more support to help manage the farm regularly as stated in the BRV Work plan.

GREATEST NEEDS

• Funding to hire work force to weed the field
• Funding to put fence around the crops to protect from wildlife

Thank you for your support.

• Full IDEFOCS update report on BRV (PDF)
  

Dear Donor,

In our last report, we shared with you the Ebola project that was necessary even before we made preparations to build a re-integration center for the former child soldiers of Liberia.  These former child soldiers were the most vulnerable due to the conditions of their living.  We are happy to tell you the Ebola project was completed successfully!

Ebola Campaign Impact:

There was tremendous output from 10 different communities at the campaign exercise. They were eager to understand how they could help fight the Ebola pandemic themselves. Concrete education and prevention on the virus were provided to the communities. They were all happy to receive such education and physical illustration on the origin and danger of Ebola. Each community was given a bucket/barrel, chlorines, and soap as practical means of fighting the Ebola virus.  Each member of the community also became an educator in promoting safety measures on the Ebola pandemic in their various homes.

Please see attachment for full report.

Reintegration Center Update

Now that the Ebola pandemic is under control, our full focus is on the Reintegration Center.  The first part of the project is to prepare the farmland which will help rehabilitate the soldiers and help make the center able to support itself.  In the past two weeks, local workers from Little Bassa provided the brushing and tree felling services.  Now the land is ready from burning and clearing (which is scheduled in February).  As we receive more donations we will be able to continue with the next part of the project.

Thank you for your contributions.  If you would like the new Action10 monthly newsletter, you can sign up at Action10.org.

All the best to you and your family.

• Ebola Final Report (PDF)
  

Even before we make preparations to build a re-integration center for the former child soldiers of Liberia, we are currently faced with a deadly epidermic disease called EBOLA with high number of casualties reported in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. These former child soldiers are the most vulnerable due to the conditions of their living.

EBOLA virus disease (EVD) or EBOLA hemorrhagic fever (EHF) is a disease caused by an ebolavirus. Symptoms start two days to three weeks after contracting the virus, with a fever, sore throat, muscle pain and headaches. Typically, vomiting, diarrhea and rash follow, along with decreased functioning of the liver and kidneys. Around this time, affected people may begin to bleed both within the body and externally. The disease has a high risk of death. 

The IDEFOCS/Action10 initiative

IDEFOCS/Action10 has agreed to join forces with the government and other concern groups to provide awareness and preventive measures on the EBOLA virus to the former child soldiers community (ghettos). We believe this requires an immediate response.

Justification

An awareness and preventive measures campaign against EBOLA is highly imperative in the fight against the deadly EBOLA virus.. We deemed this exercise a matter of urgency to erase the scepticism that the Ebola virus is not real in Liberia, as if ignore, it has the ability to endanger the lives of many citizens across Liberia especially the ghetto dwellers. We also think it is important to educate our targeted partners on the pandemic and provide them preventive measure to help reduce the risk of widely spreading the virus. This campaign exercise is going to involve everyone living in the ghetto vicinity, not the IDEFOCS/Action10 targeted partners alone.

Goal

The goal with the initiative is to provide awareness and preventive measures as to how we all can help combat the EBOLA Virus within ghettos communities.

Target partners

IDEFOCS and Action10 have agreed to focus our efforts on our Target partners and have identified ten ghettos in the Paynesville City, Monrovia ghettos for the initiative.

Objectives

The objectives are:

• To provide preventive education on the EBOLA virus
• To provide chlorine and other materials for each targeted ghetto
• To put in place a leadership structure that will manage the chlorine exercise and cleaning up of each ghetto everyday

Inputs

The inputs are:

• IDEFOCS/Action10 establishes and trains a team of eight men volunteers.
• The volunteer team carries out EBOLA virus preventive education in each of the ten targeted ghettos.
• Materials and chlorine will be provided to each ghetto which will last for ninety days.

Expected output and outcome

• Ghetto dwellers will be more knowledgeable of the EBOLA Virus and its preventive measures.
• Materials and chlorine will be available in each ghetto to help support the preventive measures in actual practice.
• A Leadership structure will be put in place in each ghetto to manage daily cleaning up and wash of hands activities within each ghetto.

Expected impact

• The spread of EBOLA Virus in the ghetto vicinity will be prevented.
• Ghetto dwellers will contribute to the combating of the wide spread of the deadly Ebola Virus in Liberia.

Campaign strategy

The campaign strategy was approved by the Action10 medical expertise in Sweden.

• The campaign starts with that IDEFOCS/Action10 conducts a one day workshop that will train eight volunteers on how to implement the IDEFOCS/Action10 EBOLA ninety days Awareness Campaign.

• After the workshop, IDEFOCS/Action10 visits each of the ten targeted ghettoes to post and inform about the work plan of the Ebola Virus Campaign activities. During this process, we will pre-identify the leadership structure which will be responsible for managing the donated materials from IDEFOCS/Action10.

• Thereafter IDEFOCS/Action10 holds a one day awareness campaign in each of the ten ghettos.

• The one day awareness activities will educate targeted partners on the history of EBOLA, its danger and preventive measures that can be applied on a daily basis. There will be distribution of flyers and stickers in the targeted ghetto community by ghetto dwellers.

• At the end of the activity, IDEFOCS/Action10 puts together a leadership structure with the responsibility of properly manage the prevention materials donated to each targeted ghetto. The campaign in each ghetto will climax with the distribution of water pump drums, chloride and other detergents. The water pump drum mix with chloride will be placed at a particular station where everyone can easily have access, so they can wash their hands every time they are going out and coming in to the ghetto.

• After the workshop the IDEFOCS/Action10 will organise a bi-weekly monitoring and evaluation of the hand washing and cleaning up of the ghetto to identify obstacles and way forward after the five days implementation.

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Global Giving Challenge

We believe, this is a good start to reach our goal of re-integrating the former child soldiers of Liberia to society.!

Your continous giving to this project is appreciated!

We are still aiming to raise $ 2 000 more to get a permanent spot on Global Giving website. This is a link to our project.

http://www.globalgiving.org/projects/re-integrate-600-former-child-soldiers-in-liberia/

Thank you once again!

Frederick Owusu