I have been mugged by the people of Ethiopia and I feel great about it. Let me explain.
Just nine months after joining international development charity Send a Cow (SAC), I was despatched to Ethiopia to see the programmes in action. It’s one of seven countries Send a Cow works in and the focal point of our current fundraising campaign – which is DFID UK aid matched - Planting Hope.
Now I have travelled pretty widely. I have seen and met many poor people struggling to survive, as well as those flourishing through the circumstances of their birth or the opportunities family connections have enabled.
But this was different. This was meeting people who wanted to improve their lives but genuinely didn’t know how to until SAC stepped in and working with the community, developed programmes that take people from extreme hunger to food security in a matter of weeks.
SAC’s approach is intensive on-the-ground training with community groups forming the bedrock of change. Our wonderful, in-country teams work through every aspect of changing a family’s future from household relationships, especially between couples, and farming techniques to the management of money, the concept of savings and the development of assorted income streams to future-proof life through enterprise.
And it’s working. Within a matter of weeks families were telling me they were able to eat regularly, sell the surplus and start sending their children to school. The seeds, locally sourced livestock and tools provided by SAC add to their ability to transform their lives, but it’s the knowledge they gain and the support they get from one another that makes their long-term transformation achievable.
So how come I was mugged? Well it wasn’t literal – it’s metaphorical. As I stumbled into the kitchen following an eight-hour overnight flight, desperate for a cup of tea I stood in a quandary wondering which mug I should use. And my mind flashed back to the mud dressers SAC farmers have been taught to build so their few cups, pots and platters are away from the floor.
I was struck by how ludicrously over-stuffed my relatively simple home is with possessions – how any one of those many mugs, cups, plates and bowls would be so much better deployed in Ethiopia than in the cosy confines of my English, SW village.
I can resolve not buy any more “stuff” until I genuinely need it – which probably means never as far as mugs are concerned… And I know working in a charity means I am doing my bit when you consider salaries in the third sector versus the commercial world.
But what this trip has really left me with is an overpowering sense of injustice and the urgent need for all of us to do something about it. We have all seen and heard the horror stories about aid in Africa, but I have just witnessed quick, tangible results that will change generations of families and communities forever. Its not about hand-outs - its about giving a hand-up and we are all mugs if we can’t see that.
