Project Manager: Gawangjyid (Maybelle)
to purchase 90 solar generating panels for 90 households and improve living conditions for Cuozhou Township, Jiajia Township and Duojia Township
Funds needed: $10,494(71,930 rmb)
Gawangjyid is from Yehe Village, Cuozhou Township, Jiantsa County, Huangnan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, China. She is working towards an Associates Degree in English at Qinghai Normal University Nationalities Department’s English Training Program.
Project Location
This project will be located in Cuozhou Township (exactly in Cuoxiong Village, Lhade Village, and Yehe Village), Jiajia Township (in HaxiuVillage, Ruma Village, Waze Village and Jiangze Village), Duojia Township (in Lhajiong Village and Langha Village), Jiantsa County, Huangnan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, PRC. Cuozhou Township is 180 kilometers away from Xining, the capital city of Qinghai province. Jiajia Township and Duojia Township are 185 kilometers away from Xining City. All of these areas are both agricultural and nomadic villages with 270 families’ total. Half of the family members herd in the pastures and half of them farm in the field.
Population
In these nine villages there are 1890 people, making up 270 households. Usually there are 1530 people in the farming areas and 360 people in the pastures. This project will directly benefit 90 households with 630 people from those nine villages. Of these 630 people, 221 are children, 201 are men and 208 are women. These are very poor people who cannot afford cheap, low-quality solar panels. (The project manager selected the poorest families from these villages with the help of the village leaders and some old, faithful villagers).
Education
Only 56 out of the 221 children currently attend school. 7 of them are college students（3 girls and 4 boys）18 of them are middle school students (7 girls and 11 boys) and 31 of them are primary school students 14 girls and 17 boys. The rest of the 165 school aged children help their parents with herding and farming. All of the middle aged and old people are illiterate in these villages due to the following reasons:
Before 1981, all the fields and livestock were shared by all the villagers together. Whichever family labored more for the public fields and livestock got more barley and wheat. Therefore, at that time all the parents kept their children at home for labor. Consequentially all the villagers worked very hard and didn’t have time and money to pay for tuition. Hence the entire population of old and adult villagers are illiterate now.
After 1981, fields and livestock were divided for each household. Since then, each family owned their own fields or livestock. But they were too poor to send their children to the school immediately. After they divided the fields and livestock, they could only have around ten sheep or goats and five yaks according to the number of family members who could work. Although they still do not have a large amount of livestock, they have to herd them in the pasture for the whole year. When they are herding they cannot leave to earn additional income and thus cannot afford tuition for schooling
Cash Income
Every year, each household could earn 700-800 rmb on average by digging caterpillar fungus. (Caterpillar fungus is a kind of herb and plant that grows on the grassland. And they can sell it with around 8-9 rmb for each.) They have to buy clothes, tea, salt, candles, vegetables and also some barley and wheat with that little money. Due to their low incomes they are unable to purchase sufficient supplies for the whole year. With that little money, they buy around 70 candles costing about 90 rmb for the whole year. They only use these candles when it’s entirely dark that they can’t see anything at all with burning sap. They’re also used some other special evenings such as when guests are at their home or during ceremonies or ritual evenings
Agriculture
The villagers in these nine villages plant wheat, barley, potatoes, and beans. The richest families have 3.5-mu of fields to plant those crops (just enough for a year’s worth of food without surplus). Each year they can produce 500 jin of barley, wheat or potatoes, per mu. However, the poorer families only have 2 mu of fields, which means 2 mu to feed all members of the family. If one year has less rain, those poorer families might not even have enough food for themselves. Sometimes the government gives one or two packs of flour to the poorest families, but this is not sufficient.
Herding
These villages are semi-nomadic places. In these nine villages, 122 households have only five or six yaks, 114 households have around 10sheep, and 32 households have 4 or 5 yaks and also 7 or 8 sheep (these families are the relatively rich families in the villages). Some families don’t have yaks but might only have around ten sheep. This project will benefit 47 families from 122 households who only have yaks and 43 families from 114 households who only have sheep, because these 90 families are the poorest families in this area.
Project goals
The overall goal of this project is to improve living conditions for Cuozhou Township, Jiajia Township and Duojia Township.
The immediate purpose of this project is to purchase 90 solar generating panel for 90 households
Electricity is essential for our lives, but those 630 villagers not only live in darkness at night, but also they can’t see anything on the TV to get information or broaden their view of the world. More importantly, if there is light, there will be fewer instances of villagers getting hurt by yaks. Access to light will also improve villagers’ access to education.
Problems
Sometimes those 90 households who are in the pasture lose their livestock during their herding and are not able to drive them home before dark. Therefore, they have to milk and feed the lambs, bucks or baby yaks during the night. One of woman was blinded by a yak’s horn when she was trying to tie the yak to its line during the night; the yak stuck its horn in her left eye. She doesn’t have money to go hospital to heal it, so her left eye has been blinded since then. While a thirteen year old girl was feeding a baby yak underneath its mother, one another yak came to attack the baby yak and its mother. That girl was placed between the two yaks and she was terribly wounded. In winter, the villagers have to keep their lambs and baby goats on their kang (bed made of earth; smoke comes from an adobe stove and heats the bed) under the basket. One night, a mother was cooking in the darkness when her little baby was sleeping. While she heard the scream, a lamb came to the baby and chewed the baby’s fingers. So, villagers were terrified, although they cautiously take care of themselves to avoid those risks, those dangerous events occur only during the dark time, so if they have solar panels, they can make light in the house and carry the light to outside also to see the livestock. Until now, seven villagers have been terribly wounded by livestock due to lack of light.
Because the villagers don’t have enough money to buy candle, they usually burn sap to make light till it is very dark, and then they would light candles. They can collect sap from the trees, but they can’t make too much light from it. Candles produce more smoke in an already smoke-filled house. Plus they also have to cook by burning wood or yak dung, which creates more smoke as well. The smoke makes the villagers’ eyes tear up all the time and gradually damages villagers’ eyes. In addition, it is very dark usually when they are feeding their livestock, so they can’t see if there is dirty garbage such as worn-out pieces of clothes or plastic bags in the animals’ food. (Animal foods are dried straws and the surface of wheat, which are usually on the ground randomly, so it is easy to mix with garbage.) Because they pour it to the livestock’s bowl with a big spoon and mix it in to a little bit flour with a stick. Hence sometimes livestock would die from contaminated food. However, the villagers would eat its meat though it was dead of illness, because food is not so sufficient for them if they don’t eat it. Hence some villagers would become strictly ill and sometimes a few of them would die. All the villagers have had stomachaches; one girl and an old man were dead because of eating contaminated yak meat.
From this year, the government decided not to collect tuition for primary and middle school students. Hence the rate of attending school is increasing in other villages. However, those 165 children from those 90 households still can’t attend school, because all of the children have to help their parents to try to finish the house work before dark. Further more, those 56 children who are attending school are unable to finish their homework or read other books at home when it is dark. These villages are located in a remote area. They don’t have electricity to see movies or watch TV. They have no access to see about other people, societies, countries, and global issues.
Benefits
Due to all of potentially harmful and dangerous things that can unexpectedly happen in darkness this project will improve these 630 villagers’ safety. Because at least they could see what is happening and what is around them.
Supplying this project will improve the villagers’ health. If these people have electricity generating panels, they don’t have to burn as much sap to create light and won’t have to destroy their eyes from its smoke.
If they have electricity, they could see if there any dirty things in the livestock’s food or not (i.e., they can bring the livestock’s bowl inside the house under the light to see if there is any garbage or not. They can take the light bulb with them to give food to the livestock, because the bulb’s line is pretty long and the distance from people’s room and livestock room are very short). Then the livestock will get sick less often. As a result, the villagers won’t die or get sick from eating contaminated livestock. Therefore, providing this project can improve the villagers’ health.
If this project is funded, most of those 165 children would have a greater opportunity to graduate from primary or middle school and become literate. Those students who are attending school will be able to do their homework and do some reading in the evening. Hence this project can give opportunities for those 39 children to improve their primary and middle school education. When I talked to some of the parents, they said that now they have solar cookers from a previous Shem project they do not need to collect as much yak dung as before, so they can send their children to primary school and middle school at least. Not many children were sent to the school, but at least 7 children were sent to the school after my solar cooker project was done.
Gender Equality
Usually women and girls cook in the house for family members and feed livestock in the darkness. If this project is funded, women and girls’ difficulties related to light would be driven away. Men and boys would also be happy about it, because they are also not comfortable when their mothers, sisters and wives are suffering from darkness. So local men, women and children are involved in the project planning and will be involved in implementation and maintenance, because all of them will benefit from this project directly.
This project will also improve people’s perceptions of women and their capabilities. Women’s social status in this village is very low. Girls are not expected to do any helpful things for the villagers and their community. For example, when I was doing the clothes project for the first time, the villagers really didn’t believe what I was doing and they wondered how I could do that. Their idea of me changed a little since I have completed two clothes projects. When I first had a meeting with the villagers and discussed the urgent need for solar cookers, they thought I was not capable enough to do such a big job; they didn’t take the project seriously. However, after I completed the solar cooker project, their view of me totally changed. They paid me compliments and said that I was “even more capable than a man.” Not only their view of me changed, but they also paid more of their attention to their daughters.
Effect on Children
Children also benefit as I stated in the Benefit part. Specifically this project will help them in many ways. First of all, this project will help children attending school. Secondly they can do home works under the light that the teachers won’t get angry at them and punish them, and also they can read the texts or other books to catch up the other students or learn more. And thirdly babies don’t get hurt at least from lambs and calf in the darkness. Children also won’t be hurt by livestock. All of them will grow up without get injury in the night. It is very sad to see that a child got injured and stay with it in his or her whole life. So this project will stop those uncomfortable and pity thing to happen. More over, the villagers said as far they know, children’s eyes are easy to be hurt, the light from solar panel won’t hurt children’s eyes though they read many books under the light than the smoke comes from the sap burning for making light does.
Government Support
May 3rd, 2006 - Gawangjyid talked to the government leader Namlah. He gave enthusiastic consent and said that he would appreciate it if the donors realized our difficulties and funded any kind of project.
Project Steps
Have a meeting with the family leaders (men and women) to collect information of their urgent needs or biggest problems in each village. (I did this)
The project manager and the village leaders selected the 90housholds.
Choose four people from each village to take responsibility for any kind of work related to the project. Two responsible women, the village leader and another man who takes care of the village usually. Also choose a general leader to take responsibility for all of them. (I discussed this with the villagers and they said they would do the work if the project was funded.)
Find the Solar Electricity Generating Panel Company selling the cheapest and best quality and make sure we know how much it will cost per solar electricity generating panel. This step has already been completed, and we will use the Huangnan Autonomous Prefecture’s Nima Brand Company Factory because of their great reputation and history of success. (completed)
Write project proposal. (completed)
Find a donor for funding and send the proposal.
Hold a meeting with villagers (men, women and children), and discuss each person’s contribution of labor (e.g. carry solar electricity generating panel to the village, distribute to each family and make sure everybody knows how to use it, take responsibility for not damaging the solar electricity generating panel).
Have a meeting with all of those four people from each village to arrange a time to carefully carry the solar electricity generating panel to each village.
Purchase the most cost-effective, best quality solar electricity generating panel and carry them in the Nima Brand Company truck to the village.
After distributing the solar electricity generating panel to each family and making sure everybody knows how to use it, supervise the process of the project with four people who are already chosen. Do this with the general leader, whom we’ve already chosen, and the four people chosen from each village.
Complete project.
Interview villagers (men, women and children) and take pictures.
Complete final report.
Send final report with all pictures and receipts.
Time Frame
This project takes 35 days to complete it from the project is funded
2 days: Have a meeting with the villagers and choose two people to buy solar electricity generating panels. (Choose these two people from 36 people who are already chosen to take responsibility for the project).
5 days: Purchase solar electricity generating panels and carry them to the villages.
5 days: Give solar panels to 90 households
12 days: Interview residents and take pictures.
11 days: Complete the final report and send to the donor.
Detailed Budget
|
Item |
Price per |
Number |
Donor |
Local |
Other resource |
Total
|
|
Solar Panel |
900 |
90 |
71,100 |
9,900 |
0 |
81,000 |
|
Transportation |
500 |
1 |
500 |
0 |
0 |
500 |
|
Management expenses |
|
|
330 |
250 |
0 |
580 |
|
Management Payment |
|
|
0 |
0 |
500 |
500 |
|
Total |
|
|
71,930 |
10,150 |
500 |
82,580 |
The total project cost: 82,580rmb
The total donor contribution: 71,930 rmb (10,494dollars)
The local contribution: 10,150rmb
Shem Women’s Group: 500rmb
Sustainability
This project is a sustainable project. As I mentioned all the villagers (men, women, and children) are involved in planning and implementing this project. And also they are the indigenous people, so they are clear about the difficulties that I mentioned in the ‘problem’ part. Therefore, they will recognize the benefit of solar electricity generating panels and take care of them as if they were treasures. This project will be sustained for at least ten years because the solar electricity generating panels that we will buy are of good quality. The few families in neighboring villages who have already bought solar electricity generating panels from Nima Brand Company have used them for four years. I went to ask them about the quality as I did when I was doing the solar cooker project for Yehe village, and they claimed the quality was excellent. They didn’t find any flaws during the four years of use. Also one of our Shem members bought solar panels from Nima Company (two other Shem members have bought from Nima Company, but not in Huangnan Prefecture) and she vouches for their quality. Additionally, the solar panels are covered by one year warrantee from Nima Company.
Additional Information
I completed one solar cooker project for 350 people in Yehe village in December 2006. When I was doing that project, a neighbor villager came and asked for solar cookers for their village. Therefore, I told them that I would try my best to write another solar cooker proposal for them. Recently, however, I heard that the government is going to give them solar cookers. Hence I wrote this solar panel proposal for them.
So far, I have completed two used clothes projects and one solar cooker project which solved many problems that the villagers are facing. I will implement this project as soon as it is funded and will then write a proposal for a threshing machine.
Interviews
When I decided to do this project, I interviewed many people in each of the nine villages. When I interviewed an old woman named Tsering Dorma she said that not having electricity or light at night was very difficult for her, but she’d never imagine that she could use a solar panel, because it’s too expensive for them to afford. She cried in despair, making me also cry.
Another interview was conducted with a young man named Deger. He said the lack of light it was not sorrowful for him, because he believed that is his karma. However, he really didn’t want his son to have this kind of life. He said that once he sent his son to the school which was far away. His son came back home after dark every day, so he could not do his homework. It was too difficult for his son to continue his studies, so he stopped going to school. The man said that this was the biggest sorrow of his life.
Map of Project Site
