Camden Woman & West Bay Rotarian Completes Service Project in Lesotho, Southern Africa

Mon, 04/25/2016 - 8:15pm

West Bay Rotarian, Deborah Hitchings, cofounder of Qholaqhoe Mountain Connections (QMC), recently returned from Lesotho, southern Africa where she worked with children who are facing the consequences of a dire drought.

Qholaqhoe Mountain Connections is a small, non-profit that works with AIDS orphans and high school students in the remote Qholaqhoe Mountain region of the country. Founded in 2009, its mission is to assist the local population with education, sustainable farming practices and food security. This year, because of the drought, the organization’s primary focus has been upon supplementary food supplies and education.  

Lesotho is a very mountainous country in which 80% of the population are subsistence farmers who depend upon their yearly crops yields in order to survive. For the second year in a row lack of rain has caused catastrophic crop failure meaning that families have no food stored away for the upcoming cold winter months.

 “Some rains came to the country in late January and February while I was there. But those few deluges were deceptive as they greened up the surface, allowing weeds and grasses to sprout, even some late summer crops like spinach, cabbage, beetroot, beans and to get some of the water taps flowing again.” said Hitchings,  “But, the rains have done nothing to affect the larger impact of the drought - to mitigate in any way the impact of fields laying fallow, of crops withered in the fields, of the lack of production of vital food basics such as corn for the second growing season. It is now being called the green drought.”

These staples, especially corn, are absolutely vital to carry the population through the winter. Experts see no relief until at least 2017.

QMC supports an orphan garden that feeds a group of about 100 AIDS orphans who live in nearby villages. These children depend upon the supplementary food offered at the garden for their survival.

Yet, for the past two years yields at the garden have been pitiful. It wasn’t even planted this year, as the soil was bone dry with no rain and no water coming to their water storage tank.

At the high school, where sponsors provide scholarships to 68 students who otherwise couldn’t afford the $250 necessary to attend school, the story was the same. Children spoke of the scarcity of food and administrators told of the rapidly increasing cost of basic food supplies like maize meal, beans, sorghum etc.

One student explained in a letter to her scholarship sponsor: "My life was very hard this last year because there was drought, There was no water so when we were at school we fetched some water from a very far place and we had not enough time to study. As we had the drought we did not plough the fields and this shows that there is a lot of poverty this year. Now it is raining and we are beginning to grow vegetables, not maize because its time is past."

The group’s dilemma while there was to figure out what it could do. “How could we be a positive impact on the lives of the people in the villages where we visit? We knew we needed to keep kids in school during this difficult time, and  it was obvious that the most vital need is to fill bellies.” explained Hitchings, “That we can do, at least in part, at least for now. We can make a difference to this small population of people.”

That financial assistance is possible because of tremendous community support both on the part of individuals and organizations for all aspects of QMC’s efforts on the mountain. Here locally, West Bay Rotary has been a huge supporter from the start, providing scholarship aid for two students and helping to fund several projects such as a water storage tank and the purchase of laying hens.

A Rotary District Grant this year is providing funding for supplementary food supplies for the local orphans and an emergency food fund at Qholaqhoe High School for a growing number of kids who have no food at home. The timing of the grant couldn’t have been better explains Hitchings, given that the drought is having such a dramatic impact on the local population.

West Bay Rotary even made it possible for QMC to give the orphans a Kentucky Fried Chicken picnic lunch one Saturday morning.

Camden Rotary and Rockland Rotary have also provided financial support over the years through scholarship aid and additional donations to allow QMC to help with such things as the water storage tank and school uniforms.

“The support, both financially and emotionally, that Rotary has given me and QMC is huge,” says Hitchings, “We wouldn’t be where we are today without these fantastic clubs.”

The Congregational Church of Camden, where Mrs. Hitchings is employed, has also been a supporter from the start. The Outreach Committee and the Youth Group have supported scholarship students. This year added funds were donated to help with the purchase of basic food supplies during the drought.  The Sunday School kids earmarked their January collections for the purchase of apples for the picnic at the orphan garden.

Other organizations such as Elm Street Marketing Solutions, Green with Envy, Fresh off the Farm, dentists Dr. Roula Giannos and Dr. Deb Endl and the Lions Club’s Young Leos have supported the group’s efforts as well.

Seventeen of the 68 students sponsored at the high school are funded through local groups and individuals right here on the midcoast. Mrs. Hitchings explained. “There is tremendous local support for these dynamic kids who just want a chance at an education, an education that they couldn’t get without sponsors paying their school fees.”

Hitchings and her fellow board members at QMC will be watching the developments of the drought closely this year, keeping in touch with the folks on the mountain in order to determine how next to focus their efforts. For more information on QMC visit www.qmconnect.org.