We had the second day of our Farmers meeting today and it was a very fruitful day with much accomplished. We are united in our desire to push the vision forward with five pilot sites. Not yet sure where the five will be. But the highlight for me was the visit all 15 of us took to our pilot site of Gueriguinde to see the results. When I went to speak, I was choked up for the first time. Told everyone, when I finally got the words out, that a year ago exactly, Dov and I put the very first shovel into the ground and here we were seeing lettuce and tomatoes and children taking care of the garden with drip irrigation. They grafted their own Moringa trees and will be selling them for profit shortly. The people from the Ministry of Education seemed particularly pleased and impressed that the adults in the community were engaged and interested as well, answering questions about grafting…..

Dov arrived from India and we had a lovely dinner debriefing him and sharing what we felt after our two days. John and Judy were then greeted, of course, by the former Mayor, the Chef du Canton, the former Vice mayor, Hamani, and Fati, the Mayor’s wife all bearing gifts for them!!!!

Tomorrow they leave at 7am from the hotel, and I am on my own for the day with the committee, Hamani and others……..almost time to go home. And another goodbye.

The day started early with breakfast at the Grand hotel and then a short ride to the ICRISAT facility in Niamey, just across the bridge. Here we met with 14 people from the Ministry of Education, NGOS VIE and FAO, and ICRISAT reps and others to discuss the curriculum of the Farmers of the Future and how to proceed. It was a lively discussion chaired by John, from Eliminate Poverty Now  whild his wife Judy took notes….a task I did not envy, as we had simultaneous translation and the difficulty in capturing the essence of the discussion while listening to two voices is tough. Hats off to Judy. John did a masterful job of weaving everyone’s comments together and it will be interesting to see how it all unfolds. Read the rest of this entry »

It is 10pm Niger time and I am reflecting on our long but very productive day in Libore! Up early to visit the Scholarship girls in the CES school, the girls who are in the seconde, premiere and terminal level of school, just prior to going to university if they make it. What a lovely group of girls. We talked about what they hoped to be in their future and each one still talked of being a doctor. Inside the library, which has now been reconfigured and looks great, we met the librarian , Fati, and some other teachers. The headmaster spoke at length to me, Judy and John about the conditions. He said that with the new policy of the government, passing children from one level to the next whether in fact they are qualified to pass has not worked well. As a result there are now children in middle school, or college as they call it, who still cannot read or write. Part of the problem remains the lack of training for many of the teachers. There are now 11 students this year in the final year of high school, 9 boys and two girls and next year will be the very first year that some might do well enough to get into university.Never before has any student reached this level from Libore. Our fingers are crossed. The girls still are having problems with physics and math and they have no option to take other courses as there aren’t enough students to open up a “literature” stream. so for now everyone must take science and math. Read the rest of this entry »

Just arrived in Niger with John and Judy Craig from New Jersey. As we left the plane, the ex Mayor had a special VIP van waiting for us on the tarmac, with a sign that said “ROBIN”! There is no better way to arrive in a country than have a greeting like this! Then we met the current Mayor Zenaboo and she was lovely! Of course Fatouma was there and once we retrieved our luggage we saw Hamani and the rest of the gang. Off to the Grand hotel…..John and I riding with Amadou, and Judy with Fatouma. Saw all the familiar faces at the Grand hotel….they all asked about Ed and Sam from my previous trips. Have a lovely room, in a bungalow….but had to be moved as the air conditioning wasn’t working and the heat is oppressive for February. Read the rest of this entry »