Nigerian Cuso/VSO Placement June 16, 2010
Good to hear from you. Thanks for the update on your preparations to go and help Fantsuam Foundation (FF) with permaculture and other things at Attachab. Have you been in contact with any of the other people there I wonder, besides Teleri. Fantsuam has quite a collection of present and past voluteers from VSO and CUSO. It is a good dynamic placement where your skills will be well used. Your experence of a five acre "hobby farm" sounds very useful. I expect you have discovered by now that some people in Nigeria who describe themselves as "farmers" are closer to the UK idea of a market gardener, or smallholder, or allotment holder (I don't know how you'd describe those in Canada). When I am in Nigerai it reminds me of when I lived deep in the Cornish countryside - the same sounds of chickens, cockerels and goats - and the same community feeling of people greeting each other and knowing each others business.
Regarding the information you have had from Marcus - have you spoken to him on Skype or by phone, or just exchanged emails? He can give you best starting information regarding permaculture details in West Africa from what he and others saw and learned at Benin. This is partly because he straddles the two cultures, so he will understand the kind of questions you will be asking yourself. He can also tell you the realities of how Attachab is only near the starting point at the moment regarding permaculture. He does know something of the local crops at Fantsuam too, but obviously not nearly as much as John and all the other locals.
When you get to Fantsuam you will begin to understand how things are very dynamic and holistic and interwoven. If you are thinking of a "typical project" to introduce permaculture then you will be in for a surprise. You are not going to a typical top-down two year or five year intervention to bring permaculture methods to a set location. The local permaculture interest is growing more organically than that - so hold your assumptions lightly and do not think of the Attachab project as something very neat and tidy happening all on its own. It will move forward in ways that fit with everything else that is going on.
Attachab eco-village existed as an idea before there was a site of that name, and the site existed before people started to learn about permaculture as a way to make the most of the site (One of the objectives at Attachab is to learn what works and then share good practice). See Cicley's blog about John's vision for Attachab - with photos including the model that John displayed, long before he had the Attachab site, so people would catch his vision. To give you a somewhat simplified explanation of the Attachab site, it was made available to John by a local chief who wanted Fantsuam Foundation to be more closely involved in his locality. The idea of permaculture was something that Marcus brought with him when he came to Attachab to build the eco-dome. There was no chance to follow up on the idea and learn more about permaculture is West Africa until it was possible to arrange the trip to Benin for Marcus and some of the FF team.
There is huge readiness to try things out and do things at Fantsuam, but there are always delays because the money is simply not there to provide all the training and support and move things on as quickly as people would like. Having your knowledge on site (at whatever level) will be such a help in enabling people to move things forward regarding permaculture and related activities. Don't worry if you don't know all the answers yet - it will be a shared learning experience. (There is nothing worse than someone who thinks s/he already knows all the answers, especially going to a different culture - readiness to learn and share what you are learning is far more useful.)
There is enthusiasm to experiment with, and adopt, the methods shown in Benin. I understand that Sambo has been doing what he can - but it is not his job - it just has to be fitted around his normal work. Others are interested but, again, they can only do what they can do in a small-scale personal approach - that is why keyhole gardens were of interest. See First Thursday feedback about keyhole gardening (with photo). When you are at FF then more attention will go to things at Attachab, not just because you will be there to do something, but because while you are there other people will want to work alongside you to make the most of having you there.
At Fantusam you have a dynamic holistic community development programme responding to local needs - so all kinds of things are going on at the same time, and there are simply not enough hours in the day. This week for instance Sickle Cell Disease is taking centre stage for very good reasons. The week before last the main focus was a response to some street children begging in the local market. In theory a foreign aid programme is going to help Fantsuam Foundation (FF) to help feed these children, but that funding hasn't come through yet, so people were trying to work out how the occasional meal could be cooked for the children with no funds available. (Fortunately someone had just given us 70 UKP so we were able to send that straight on to FF to help towards ingredients - when there is nothing then every little helps).
To get a flavour of what goes on you may like to follow Nikki's blog. It gives an idea of the weekly UK-Nigeria meetings (which enable Nikki and me to keep up to date and ready to act as John's eyes, ears and voice here in the UK, and on the Internet)
If you have some specific questions that need answering to help you make the most of your preparation time let me know. You will get a lot of answers from Marcus, and maybe we could have a voice chat too before you travel. You might also like to join in one of our regular online sessions between UK and Nigeria. Of course there are some problems with the timezones in Canada but maybe we can move things around a bit - or maybe you are an early riser. We did have someone from Canada at the June "First Thursday" meeting (they are normally at 12.00-13.00 GMT).
If there is any way that I can help you to prepare please let me know. I hope we do talk before you travel, because once you are in Nigeria we will probably be in contact through the UK-Nigeria meetings. As those are typed meetings it helps to have met F2F or by voice as well.
Looking forward to working with you
Pamela