By Bala Yusuf Yunusa, Team Leader

Prior to the Millennium Villages project, poverty and hunger in Pampaida were widespread, with most of the population living below $1 a day and many experiencing food insecurity. Therefore, malnutrition was very high, with approximately one quarter of the children under five underweight and nearly half chronically undernourished. At the start of the project, even the most basic infrastructure was also lacking. Residents traveled 10 km to the closest market and the nearest paved road was 12 km away, reachable by a poor quality dirt road. There was no electricity and increasingly scarce fuel wood which served as the main energy source. There was neither cell phone coverage nor landlines. Access to safe drinking water was extremely limited. A small minority of households had access to an improved sanitation facility, and even the schools lacked functioning latrines. There was just one dilapidated primary school in the cluster with just five teachers. Only a small fraction of the students were girls, who often marry very early between 12–15 years. There was no secondary school in the village. There was also no health clinic and the nearest referral hospital was 25 km away. Even in neighboring health facilities, basic immunizations, contraceptives and essential drugs were usually not available.

Based upon a community assessment at the outset of the project, several priorities were determined by the cluster to be initial priorities. Agricultural inputs for poor farmers were among the first priorities that the project identified in order to secure food. A perennial water source for the entire population was another one of the major needs. In addition, classroom blocks were needed to create a viable teaching and learning environment. In the complete absence of a health center and with roads in very poor condition, construction of both a clinic and roads were necessary to provide market and health-care access.

While significant progress has been made against these initial priorities, new challenges and opportunities have evolved. For example, as agricultural productivity continues to grow, the revolving fertilizer scheme set up by the project and managed by the community may no longer meet the production needs of more enterprising farmers. Therefore, farmers are forming cooperative groups so they can meet the qualifying criteria to access larger-scale agricultural credit from local banks. In the health sector, the top priority now is to ensure recruitment of trained midwives to perform clinic-based deliveries. At the same time, the project needs to continue to look for ways to reliably and sustainably procure essential medical supplies.

In infrastructure, the provision of improved latrines at the household-level is now an opportunity, as is the expansion of the electricity grid to more remote settlements and institutions. In education, priority will be given to the process of government advocacy to ensure that qualified teachers are seconded and retained to match the cluster’s gains in infrastructure and enrollment.