A Short Summary

In early 2019 Seibo are:
-Feeding 1,021 nursery children at 34 x nurseries
-Feeding 13,442 primary school children at 12 x primary schools
-Sponsoring 73 nursery children at 24 x nurseries

What Happened in February & March 2019?

-24.42 tonnes of food delivered to our partner schools
-54 Seibo beneficiaries received school uniforms
-A Seibo Nursery School Directors Meeting was held
-Seibo staff traveled to Mzimba to monitor school feeding
-3 x schools ended their partnership with Seibo

Seibo’s Activities: Seibo Kids Uniform Distribution

Let’s take a look at some of the feel-good things achieved by our counterparts in Malawi. Less than a third of Malawi’s children attend pre-school. There’s a shortage of schools and a small fee to attend which rules out the most vulnerable children. Seibo’s partner nurseries have all agreed to provide 10% of their allocation to the most needy children in return for school feeding for all. In February 54 children began nursery thanks to Seibo’s donors and also received a free uniform

Seibo’s Activities: Seibo Nursery School Directors Meeting

Our Seibo counterparts in Malawi plan a Nursery School Directors Meeting every 2 x months. The most recent meeting was held on Feb 8th of February and attended by 22 representatives from 34 nursery schools. The issues discussed included;

Record-keeping: School enrollment, attendance and daily food stocks consumed have to be filled every school day. Schools not keeping proper records were once again encouraged to do so.

Health & Hygiene: The rainy season in Malawi brings many challenges for nurseries providing school meals. The importance of using water from a protected source & hand-washing was further reinforced.

3 x Schools Closed: Irregardless of the weather there are other challenges that we regularly face. In this period we are saddened to report that 3 x nursery schools have closed due to differences in their respective communities. The reasons for each closure is as follows.

School Closure Report- Misuku

Misuku CBCC which is registered under the Chilingani CBO has not been in operation since October. The reasons include:
-Inactive School Committee- only Chairperson was active
-Poor attendance- Chairperson going door-to-door to encourage children to attend
-Lack of volunteers-no teachers even when children were in attendance
-Lack of interest shown by village headman
-School building was incomplete- the school was not usable on rainy days

Our partners in Seibo Malawi were aware of the community’s challenges. In March of 2018 they met with village headman Kapenuka who ensured things would change for the better and a new school building would be complete by June of the same year. That never transpired and despite scheduling a further meeting in December 2018 the village headman did not turn up. At that time our team took back the rocket stove from the school for safe-keeping and now the school has closed. We will continue to monitor the situation and put the needs of the children first.

School Closure Report- Tiyanjane

Tiyanjane CBCC operated as normal until March of 2018. At some point in time the teachers who were all volunteers believed they were promised a wage from the government. As this never materialised the teachers stopped turning up even though there were children in attendance.

In October 2018 Seibo stopped supplying foodstuffs to the nursery due to its operational difficulties. Seibo met with Group Village Headman Zinganguwo in December where they received assurances the school would be back in operation. As this has yet to materialise Seibo have collected the stove & pot allocated to the nursery for safe-keeping.

School Closure Report- Limbikani

Limbikani CBCC was closed on the 19th of December 2018. The Chilomoni Community-Based Organisation cited misunderstandings in the community in their letter addressed to the Mother Teresa Children’s Centre Nursery School Advisor. In particular the school authorities had failed to reach agreement on sourcing funds to run the school which was a rented property. Due to their inability to pay rent the classroom was locked with Seibo’s feeding materials stored inside. After negotiating with the property owner Seibo were able to take back the cooking pot & stove, etc. It is our sincere hope that the community find a way to re-open the nursery and to continue providing school meals.

Seibo’s Activities: A Trip North!

Seibo in Malawi conduct quarterly meetings with our Primary School Partners in Northern Malawi. The most recent meetings took place from the 11th-15th of February at each of our 12 partner schools. The meetings took place with various stakeholders including local School Feeding Committees, School Management, PTA’s, Mothers Groups & Village Headmen.

Field Notes by Seibo Monitors!

-Macherecheta Primary School’s feeding committee had worked hard on improving cooking time to ensure feeding did not interfere with lessons. Hygiene was also much improved upon.

-Chabere Primary School used their own initiative to replace 2 basins & 4 x buckets originally supplied by Seibo. These small gestures are a real sign that the local community have a sense of ownership of their feeding programme.

–Kanyerere Primary School previously had issues gathering enough firewood. It was encouraging to hear the village headman was now directly involved in ensuring enough firewood was made available each day.

–Kazengo Primary School’s enrollment has grown to 3,309 learners and a new stove will be required to meet the additional need.

–Davy Primary School finally completed a new kitchen block. Until now they had to transfer the rocket stove to the cooking area on a daily basis which was the cause of damage to a past stove. The purpose-built kitchen block is much welcomed.

Challenges Remain!

As ever challenges remain.

Impassable Roads: The access road to Chabere, Kanyerere & Chamngulube is greatly hindering food delivery. The road is currently only accessible for motor-bikes. The community has promised to make greater efforts to maintain the road. The overall effect on Seibo’s work is worrisome as with challenging weather conditions it may become impossible to deliver foodstuffs at all.

Wear & Tear: Over 2 years has elapsed since Seibo donated the rocket stoves currently in use at each Primary School. Maintenance will be required soon or there is a chance the stoves will become unsuited for use.

This report was written before the impact of the cyclone which affected large parts of Mozambique, Malawi & Zimbabwe. With your help we hope to play a small part in enabling the children of Malawi to have a bright future- starting with a school meal & a school education. Thank you for your ongoing support for the work of Seibo in both Malawi & Japan.