Wednesday saw the second UK-Nigeria Skype meeting of 2011. However there was no gentle easing back into ‘work mode’ in the wake of the holidays! Already the Fantsuam team are quite literally building on their success of the previous 12 months.
During the week Zittnet Network Administrator Chollom had Tweeted that the roof was being put on FF’s new AIDS/HIV building.
John informed us that construction of the new laboratory has now been finished, complete with electricity supply. The next phase will be creating a borehole for the water supply plus sourcing furniture and equipment. The lab has been built in the next village to FF and is about a 15min walk away.
At Attachab it was reported that the work is continuing apace. Construction of the Farm Manager’s office has reached foundation level, the timbers have been ordered and their delivery had been planned for Monday. As is typical with the concept of Attachab, it has been decided to construct this building from timber to provide an example of different technologies. The timber building will join the compressed red earth brick building and ecodome already erected on site.
Now that John will shortly have these wonderful new buildings, he faces the challenge of finding suitable staff to help run the various programmes they will deliver. He needs an administrator for the lab but is hopeful the GAIYA programme will find a suitable retired candidate. John will also need a Farm Manager for Attachab but, until he can afford to employ and pay for this qualified manager, (as with the laboratory), he will add these duties to his already impressive workload..
The team also identified a learning challenge - namely for us to be learn to put photos up on Twitter. This is in readiness for sharing the expected photos of Attachab, the building work and the various programmes there. John reported that the colour printer and the paper that had been kindly donated had arrived at FF, and asked the UK to pass on this information to the benefactor. Fantsuam said that they would like one of the first photos they Tweet to be one of the printer!
Comfort is looking at using phones for information dissemination for women: reproductive health information and market intelligence of farm produce. John explained that it would enable their women to know the current prices of their produce so they can ask for good prices rather than be dictated to by middlemen. She said research is still ongoing and that Bala had sorted out the hardware. Now it is time to create the content which the women can access from their phones.