The first example of a civic initiative depicts constructive cooperation between a Dutch trade union worker and her partner who migrated to Uganda and a group around a former colleague in The Netherlands.
Kwataniza:
Early 1996 Ineke Jongerius, who had worked as a trainer with the Dutch Federation of Trade Unions (FNV), and her British husband Maurice Barnes, who had been a municipal councillor in London and studied at the Institute for Social Studies (ISS) in The Hague, left the Netherlands to start the RuwenZori View Guesthouse with six rooms in Fort Portal, a town 295 kilometres West of Uganda’s capital city Kampala. Not only visitors from far away came to the guesthouse, also people from the town and its surrounding areas used it and they often discussed developmental issues and ideas with the guesthouse owners.
Since the costs to support local developmental initiatives were too high for them, a group of friends in the Netherlands decided to form a solidarity association in order to provide assistance. The association was named Kwataniza, meaning ‘joining hands’ in a local Ugandan language. A group of motivated Dutch global citizens started to support the association financially. This was facilitated a bit by the Dutch government that allowed some tax-reduction for people donating for accepted ‘good causes’, development cooperation being among such ‘good causes’. At the same time a group of friends in the UK started a similar organisation called ‘Obumu’, meaning solidarity, to work with Kwataniza in supporting Ineke and Maurice to facilitate development projects.
A small board was established, chaired by Tiny Koppens from Deurne, in Brabant, who was also involved in trade union work, initially especially with young working people (members of the KWJ, (Beweging van Werkende Jongeren), who had travelled extensively outside Europe and already supported several projects in Latin America (in Peru and Ecuador) when she was younger.
Criteria for projects were formulated, most importantly to ensure that activities were demand driven, that options were selected to strengthen existing local initiatives with either investments in infrastructure and capacity building or by providing funding for short term, once-off activities, not covering the costs of salaries. The board members in the Netherlands were responsible for public relations, fund raising and looking at project proposals, whereas Ineke and Maurice used their local network to screen and assess the organisations and people requesting support and they communicated that the local organisations had to indicate clearly what their own contributions to the project were, either in cash or in kind (often labour input or offering free accommodation). The Dutch solidarity association and Ineke communicated around the ‘intake’ of activities and also about contracts and reports. Every now and then Kwataniza board members went to Uganda, at their own cost, to visit projects in the area around Fort Portal and to get a deeper understanding of the physical, political, economic, social and cultural circumstances in the district, region and country.
Type of projects supported:
Kwataniza supported a range of activities in education, sustainable agriculture, environmental management, health care, and women emancipation, the latter mainly via private sector development based on female ownership of businesses. Also young unemployed people were supported to obtain skills and get connected to the labour market.
More concretely: money was donated to build toilets in school compounds, to buy school furniture, to design and construct safe playgrounds for children, training was provided via the Agape of Hope organisation to girls in secondary schools to make sanitary towels that they could use during menstruation, and the short vocational training courses that this organisation provided for early school leavers were facilitated e.g. via the purchase of sewing machines, hairdressing scissors and other professional equipment.
Regarding sustainable agriculture Kwataniza provided support to AMA, a local organisation providing training sessions of two to three days and follow-up advice to poor female farmers in Bundibugyo district. These agricultural training sessions were hands-on. Trainees were themselves sowing, planting, fertilising, conserving water, etc. Several demonstration farms were used and seeds of highly productive and/or pest resistant plants were shared within communities. The promotion of the cultivation of a greater variety of crops, including vegetables, led to better nutrition patterns.
However, although agricultural production improved in terms of quality and quantity, food shortages remained high in the area, partially because population growth was high, leading to smaller and smaller farms. Therefore Ineke suggested to start a pilot project to include an extra training day in sustainable agriculture courses focussing on family planning. These extra training days were popular, and soon became a standard component of the agricultural training courses. Also non-farming women and men started to attend sex education and connections were made with healthcare centres that could provide access to family planning options ranging from free condoms to anti-conception pills and injections. Most importantly family planning became a topic in discussions between men and women.
In relation to sustainable agriculture Kwataniza also ventured into support for the Tooro Botanical Gardens (TBG), established by a Ugandan community, where part of the country’s biodiversity is conserved and researched by volunteers.
Tooro Botanical Gardens (TBG)
In 2001 a group of citizens in Fort Portal City in Western Uganda started the NGO Tooro Botanical Gardens to collectively support a natural green environment for conservation, education, scientific research and recreation. The main purpose of the Gardens is to be a living museum of a diverse collection of flora. Many of these plants are conserved in the gardens because of the endangered status, the decrease in biological diversity and increase in invasive species has threatened the existence of animals and plants alike. With the research they do on the flora they want to restore many of the degraded forest landscapes. Part of this process is also to educate the local community on the sustainable use of the plants so that future degradation can be prevented, and local landscapes can be maintained. Due to the nature in the gardens many species of fauna are also present within the habitats. The gardens support around 241 different animal species.
The TBGs independent work in restoring landscapes and conserving flora allows local communities to better understand their local environment and the importance of conservation. TBG does not commit to its work for the benefit of a particular group or country but as global citizens they saw the opportunity to share their work with all people to guarantee the future of local landscapes. They have committed their time and resources to this project for the benefit of people and nature with no monetary or material profit.
To assist the Tooro Botanical Gardens the Kwataniza solidarity association sponsored a building, toilets, gardening tools and a drying machine for seeds, herbs and spices. It also supported projects to help the TBG become financially self-sustaining such as through honey and other natural products from the botanic garden.
For more than a quarter of a century Ineke Jongerius and people directly around her in both Uganda and the Netherlands, have been able to support trends towards sustainable development and according to the Ugandan partners they made a difference in the lives of quite some people in Western Uganda, in a rather autonomous but highly professional way, mainly by using their knowledge, experience and networks.
After Ineke Jongerius returned to the Netherlands, mid 2021, the solidarity association Kwataniza was officially dissolved, in April 2023. Remaining funds were donated to a library in Kyabwire.
The next examples of Dutch civic initiatives were motivated by highly emotional personal losses.
The Max Foundation:
In 2004 the Dutch couple Steven and Joke Le Poole experienced a tragic loss, losing their 8-months-old son due to a viral infection. His death motivated the pair to start the Max Foundation, named after their late son. This is what the Max Foundation wishes to prevent for every child. They want to prevent undernutrition and disease for children under 5 with the evidence-based, scalable Healthy Village Approach, that is mainly working on the WASH & Nutrition Nexus.
The healthy village approach aims to ensure that a village meets multiple key indicators for a healthy and clean environment. Some of these indicators are: handwashing with soap, hygienic latrines, menstrual hygiene, and meeting minimum dietary needs. This programme helps villages to stay on a positive trajectory. The foundation does this by setting up the required networks and facilities to meet the indicators, train members of the local community, entrepreneurs, and government employees to reach and maintain these indicators. And once this has been achieved the ownership of facilities and networks is handed over to the stakeholders.
Sanitation is considered as one of the key issues needed to create a healthy and safe environment for people, especially for young children. This is why the Max Foundation has setup the WASH & Nutrition Nexus. Its main purpose is to improve the nutritional status of children in the first 1.000 days. Health interventions in the first 1.000 days of the child’s life are the most important for a healthy development. The biggest direct risk that children face when they grow up without an adequate WASH environment, are pathogens that might be digested. With WASH these pathogens are prevented from entering the bodies of young kids. WASH also often leads to poverty reduction, for instance when water can be used to help vegetable garden plants through dry spells. This can then also indirectly lead to a better health situation of children.
In 2023 the healthy village approach demonstrated measurable impact: in Bangladesh stunting rates dropped by 50% through integrated interventions in programme areas. The Foundation managed to reach 1.25 million people, monitored the growth of over 66,000 children under 5, and enabled 59,400 people to access improved sanitation. The Foundation’s school WASH programmes supported menstrual hygiene in nearly 400 schools, addressing barriers to education for girls. These major successes where also thanks to the Market Systems Approach. Through this system the Max Foundation leverages local entrepreneurship. The Foundation trains local entrepreneurs to sell sanitation and nutrition products to local communities. Via this approach these products become more accessible, providing reliable and safe access to all community members.
The Foundation is also trying to expand its operations into Ethiopia, be it with some mishaps due to ongoing conflict in parts of the country. In Ethiopia the foundation has worked closely with government bodies and communities to create 259 Village Economic and Social Associations (VESAs), allowing families, and specifically women, to save money for investments in health. The government has also allocated more budget for WASH and other health related programmes.
In Bangladesh the urban slum environment is extremely challenging. Previously effective models cannot be applied there. Therefore, the Foundation developed the Healthy Village Urban programme, which tackles issues like space constraints, high migration levels, and lack of land ownership. Local data collection and digital dashboards enabled targeted action and policy engagement at the municipal level.
Hester Foundation
Sources:
Kwataniza:
Interview with Tiny Koppens by Janny Poley, newsletters and coordinated textual
contributions of various people involved in the organisation.
On Tooro Botanical Gardens: https://tbguganda.org/?program=research-and-advocacy
Max Foundation:
Max Foundation 2023 annual report.
https://maxfoundation.org/white_paper/the-wash-nutrition-nexus/
https://maxfoundation.org/white_paper/healthy-village-approach/
Hester Foundation