Apr / May 2016No. 133

31st May 2016

Picture: 1.Ms. Li is teaching women how to prepare the training facilities

2.Ms. Xiaomin is practicing

3.Ms. Qiluo is making sugar-salt mixture water

Project Progress

Health and Livelihood Project for Yi Women

Women’s Health Education Training Implementation

photo/text   by Zichao

The Women’s Health Education Training for Yi women of Minjian Townshop of Yingjing County was held in early May in Jinghe Holiday Resort. 15 women from Tazishan and Dapingshan Villages, and some women staff of PAMB and township government attended the training. We invited Mrs. Li Ailing from Women Development Centre of Jiayi, Shaanxi Province as our trainer to provided the training.

The purpose of this training was to train some women who have known about the community participatory health education method from other villages and related departments, so that they can go back to villages to train others. After the training, DORS staff and our trained women will arrange a series of health activities for project villages.

The training methods covered “brainstorming”, “pairing” “role-playing”, “telling story”, “case discussion”, “team discussion”, “group sharing”, “game playing” etc. to explain what is participatory, the concept of health and its criteria. Mrs. Li used the participatory method to present the topics of “infantile diarrhoea prevention”, “transmission and prevention of HIV ”, “prevention of common diseases in women” and “prevention of influenza” for all women.

On the last day of the training, the women designed their own training course with the assistance from our trainer and project staff, and presented it in front of all trainees. Let’s look at some examples to share: A Ying made great advances compared to her first time standing on the platform, she now can host the training easily. Xiaomin explained the advantages of story telling on the platform which received lots of applause. Wangxing is not only good at singing but also good at providing training, and Wangxia, Qiluo……, all of them have very good performance on this training which surprised us. A training plan has been drawn up for future activities for our project villages. Hopefully we will see the effect in the coming months.

Drinking water project plan discussion and water source detection in Daping Village

In April, Mr. Nijianlin leader of the Minjian Township and 3 other staff from Water-affair Authority (WAA) of Yingjing County came to project village to look for water source. DORS discussed the drinking water situation and how to solve the clean water shortage problem with them, we all hoped to find a way to solve the problem. A plan about repairing the drinking water system was drawn up according to our discussion and the assignment of responsibility: we decided to set up a drinking water system in Daping Community. WAA is responsible for design including budgeting plan. Township government is responsible for organising labour from the village and coordinating the land issues. DORS will provide the materials.

In May, DORS and the township government organised village representatives meeting to discuss the construction plan, labour input, acceptance standard and maintenance guideline etc. A water quality detection report came out as well. Due to most of the labourers working away from the village, this project will be launched when they come back.

Micro Loan Project

Case Sharing – A Yi Minority’s Agricultural Material Grocery Store

by Xiao zhao (China WTO Tribune)  

What are you going to do if you received RMB 30,000. I would say there are lots of answers, but the best and most touching answer I heard about was from the villager of Daying Village, Pianma Town of Hanyuan County. 

I noticed a Yi Minority woman when we visited the village. she was carrying her 10 months old son on her back and selling chemical fertilizer when we got out of the car. Our visit didn’t disturb her work and she told us her story about her grocery business.

She is 32 years old, and has 2 children (the girl is 6 years old, son is only 10 month old). Prior to the grocery, the whole family expenditure was relying on her husband working away. But his income was not stable and if he couldn’t find better work, they didn’t have any extra income to support the family. They had the idea to run an agricultural material grocery store in the village so that they can better take care of their children. However, due to lack of money, the idea couldn’t come true for a long time.

“We need a dream if the dream comes true, who knows?” these are the most beautiful words I heard. Benefit from the “Cultivated villagers to start business of China” project sponsored by MasterCard, A Yi’s life is changing ……

After attending the financial & business management skill training, this Yi couple gained confidence to start the agricultural material grocery business. Under the trainers’ assistance, they did a detailed project budget and cash flow sheet, and the most important moment was that they received the initial capital of RMB 20,000 fiduciary loan to start their business.

By now, the grocery store has run for 4 months, and mainly selling agricultural pesticide, fertilizer, small articles of daily use. They gained a profit of RMB2500 monthly, which is much better than before.

By end of May, DORS has provided 51 loans totalling RMB1,317,000 and received repayment of principal of RMB264,757,  and management fees of RMB14238.

Picture: 1.Ms. Muyeguo answered question;2.Ms. Edi is learning numbers;3.Prizes for the women answering question

Villagers Start business cultivation project

In April, DORS and partner Mercy Corp organised a two-day training session about business management in Jinghe Holiday Resort of Yingjing County. 28 villagers from Tashan village and Daping Community of Minjian Town attended the training. As the Minjian Town is a Yi people migration community, most villagers can’t understand mandarin and cannot read and write, so we have to design special programme including the basic number,  reading and writing for villagers. At the financial training session, a women named E Di worked very hard to read and write, and now she can use the knowledge and the number work learned to do her home budgeting.

PAMB of Yingjing County joined in this programme and invited the local TV to report this training.

Environmental Protection Project

Fuel efficient Stove Project in Changsheng Village – a cooperation project with Poverty alleviation & Migration Bureau of Yingjing County (PAMB)

Introduced by the PAMB of Yingjing County, DORS selected the Changshang Village of Anjing Town to conduct the fuel-efficient stove project. Villagers were very interested in participating in this project. When 7 demonstration stoves were built in this village, DORS decided to launch the project for the second batch of fuel-efficient stoves in this village.

The vice secretary Mr. Chenxinmin of PAMB of Yingjing who is in charge of the Changsheng Village poverty alleviation work gave DORS much support during the project implementation. This project was implemented on time and had good effects.

There is a special family who received the support on the demonstration stage. The woman can only see with one eye and the skin on her nose was lost due to suppuration when she was young. Her husband has learning difficulties. Their children have moved out and left them living alone in the village although the children come back sometimes to help with the farm work. As a special poor family, DORS provided technician and living allowance to help them build a double stove, and PAMB provided all materials. The PAMB also used the local materials and technician to build a kitchen and a flushing toilet. The kitchen and toilet are made of bamboo and are well lit, which is good and safe for them to use, particularly as she has poor eyesight. Our sponsor praised the woman for her hard work and the well designed kitchen.

Picture: 1. before;2. after, with kitchen and toilet;3.BaiShihai teaching the householder how to use fuel-efficient stove

Learning/Communicating/Contact/Visiting

Energy Project Sponsor visited DORS

In May, Energy Project Sponsor visited DORS. Accompanied by the PAMB of Yingjing County, our sponsor visited the fuel-efficient stove project in Changsheng village of Anjing Town and Tazishan Village of Minjian Township, which were also the fourth batch energy project supported by our sponsor. In this fourth batch period, DORS will implement 500 fuel-efficient stoves for villages. Since 2008, our sponsor have supported 3 batches energy project of 1349 fuel-efficient stoves and 467 biogas construction, and trained over 40 technicians. In total  1816 families benefitted from this project. During the visit, our sponsor said, she feels like DORS’ old friend because of the project. She appreciated DORS work and hoped DORS will do well in the future.

MasterCard China invited media to visit DORS project villages.

In order to let more people know about the villagers start business cultivation project, MasterCard China invited Mr. Wangyong from China daily, Jiangxueqing from Public News and Shaoting from China WTO Tribune to interview the project beneficiaries in Pianma Township of Hanyuan County in May. Their reports are objective and pithy, providing good cases for readers.