Please donate to help build latrines in Ndorong-Sereer!

Open defecation is a serious health issue in our village. It is not uncommon to go outside and find a child squatting to relieve themselves out in the open, right in the middle of compound or the street. Adults are more discreet and venture into the fields, however rarely bring soap along to properly clean themselves. Often, people will dig a shallow hole or trench for the family and put up a millet-stalk fence for privacy. This is certainly a better alternative, but since the holes aren’t deeply dug nor reinforced with cement, the holes collapse every rainy season (sometimes even before the rainy season) and with the heavy rains, follows the waste floating throughout the village. People are aware of the health implications of open defecation. They see the parasites living beneath their children’s skin from playing in the sand. They know not washing their hands afterwards is a source of their stomach aches, diarrhea, and pink eye. The omnipresent flies landing on feces and then on our food and open sores is a primary source of giardia and infection.

Latrines provide a space that is safe, sanitary, centralized, discreet, durable, and dignified for the entire family to utilize. Our vision is to have one latrine for each family compound, a total of 63 latrines, each equipped with a “tippy-tap” hand-washing station. Additionally, our village will host a series of seminars led by Peace Corps Health Volunteers about the importance of frequent and thorough hand-washing.

This was not my idea of a project for Ndorong-Sereer. Coming in as an Agroforestry Volunteer, I’ve been focused on helping protect farmers’ fields and gardens using live-fencing species, establishing cashew and mango orchards, creating community woodlots, and helping graft improved fruit varieties. This project has been entirely orchestrated by the community. The community has organized meetings to discourse at length the importance of constructing latrines and how they can improve the health of the village. Everyone agreed latrines would benefit the village and agreed to provide at least 25% of the grant total from both in-kind contributions and cash. They held more meetings to discuss advantages and disadvantages of different latrine designs. After deciding on a simple yet effective design, attractive because of its durability and efficient use of materials, the village masons stood up and voluntarily agreed to work at a reduced wage to help with construction. The men followed, willingly volunteering to dig the 2mx2mx2m pit for women-run households whose sons and husbands have left for the city. The village chief then called a meeting for the local masons and me to discuss costs and logistics of materials and transport. Here is what we determined.

Our inventory includes:

• 504 sacks of cement, each $5.31, total $2,676
• 18 large poles of #10 rebar, each $2.76, total $49.74
• 6 large pole of #8 rebar, each $2.76, total $49.74
• 63 carts of gravel, each cart $8.29, total $522.27
• 20kg of metal wire, each $1.66, total $33.20
• 5 back and forth trips to transport all materials, each $36.48, total $182.39
• 63 reduced mason wages to construct each latrine, each $16.58, total $1,044.54

As you can see, even the smallest contribution is an enormous help. Just $2.00 can fund more than a kilo of metal wire for a latrine. A mason’s wage for one latrine is covered with $20.00. You can sponsor a latrine for an entire family for only $81.91. We need your support to raise $4,095 to help fund our vision of providing a latrine for every compound. The community has invested $1,065 in cash and is very enthusiastic and eager to begin construction. We are grateful for any amount you have to offer, please help contribute to improving the health of our village!

You can Donate Here!

Something’s Cooking in Ndorong-Sereer

For many villages in Senegal, cooking is a balancing act; a large cast-iron pot precariously poised atop three misshapen stones over a dancing open flame. Much of the heat is wasted, dissipating into the enclosed cooking hut instead of tightly directed at the bottom of the pot. This inefficiency requires more wood and more time spent cooking in a smoke-filled room. Every day, women venture further and further into the neighboring protected forest to harvest a rapidly diminishing supply of dead wood. The law forbids people from cutting living, or “wet”, trees, but when the supply is scarce, what other option is available?

There are, however, ways to reduce the fuel load and the amount smoke while cooking in the same amount of time or less by using improved cook stoves. There are prefabricated portable iron stoves for sale in larger cities, but a high up front cost often dissuades people (especially men who don’t collect firewood, don’t cook, and don’t sit in a room saturated with smoke three times a day, but who have tight control over the finances) from purchasing them. Clay stoves, entirely free and made with local materials, appear to be a more enticing alternative.

In February, I accompanied four very motivated women from my village, Mariama Diouf, Ami Diouf, Haddie Ngom, and Kumba Diouf, to the CREATE! center in Fass Barigo where we learned to make clay stoves. The stoves are inspired by the three stone cooking method, but built to fully enclose the cooking pot. This concentrates heat of the fire to the pot while significantly reducing the amount of wood needed in the three-stone method. Since less wood is being burned and the wood is being burned at a higher temperature, cooking with the clay stove also produces less smoke. In the training, the technicians did an awesome job in demonstrating how to build the cook stoves and after the lesson, we were able to build one by ourselves.

Upon returning to the village, the women set right to work in collecting materials and inviting their friends over to learn how to construct the stoves for themselves. If a woman wants a stove, she collects the materials beforehand and helps out building a stove at another compound. When it’s her turn, the original four women, those who want a stove and those who built the last stove come by to help. After the stove is built, she goes on to help construct a new stove the next compound. Below are photos of the stove-making process and the women with their finished stoves.

Millet chaff sifted to separate the chaff from the fibrous stalk. A medium sized stove requires around two large buckets of sifted chaff. Millet chaff is found in huge piles in the field where women winnow the grains from the chaff.

Clumps of clay are dug from the clay quarry nearby the village. The clumps are then pounded until fine like sand.

A bucket of sand, a bucket of millet chaff, and a bucket of clay and many enthusiastic hands are essential ingredients for a clay stove.

Women vigorously mixing the chaff, sand, and clay. Adding water and mixing until evenly moist. Its important that the mixture not be too wet or else the stove could topple over. Once adequately moist, the mixture is made into ball form to be pressed down around the mold of the pot.

The rock is levelled to the appropriate height depending on the size of the pot. One hand with thumb up for a small pot (2 kilo), two hands thumbs down for medium size pot (4 kilo), two hands with thumb up for large pot (7 kilo).

The stones are spaced evenly seven finger lengths apart from each other. The pot is then balanced on top of the stones. The stove will be constructed form-fitting the stones and pot.

The clay balls are pressed down hands width from the stones. The clay is layered until its two finger distance from the lip of the pot.

Haddie Ngom (left), Ami Diouf (center), and Mariama Diouf (right) nearly finished with a stove. The base and smoke holes remain.

Finishing the base, a single layer of pressed clay, and cutting the smoke holes. Nearly finished!!

The ladies and the finished clay stove. From left to right; Mariama Diouf, Ami Diouf, Haddie Ngom, Haddie Diouf, Hoija Diouf, Ya Fatou Saar (my host mother)

Thus far, the women have completed thirty cook stoves and there are many more to come. I’m so proud of all of them and their hard work!