THINS’ ANNUAL REPORT 2008.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS’ SUMMERY.

This annual report highlights THINS operations, activities and challenges during the year in the areas where we are operating. Particularly parts of Western, Riftvalley, Nyanza province: Siaya, Shinyalu, Ikuywa, Ileho, {around Kakamega forest, Kabujoi and Webuye}.

These are the most densely populated regions in rural Africa, with populations of upto 600 persons per square kilometer, and a population growth rate of 3% per annum. Despite being blessed with plentiful rainfall, decades of intensive agriculture production have severely depleted fertility and soil erosion is a major problem. There is a crisis of low food production in the small holder farms in these areas, coupled with high levels of poverty, infections/infestations and HIV/AIDS pandemic. Although many organizations {local, regional and international} have worked in these areas for decades, their work has tended to be a duplication and mainly on HIV/AIDS. Above all, THIN has a focus on identifying research and demonstration opportunities that would have an impact in poverty alleviation.

Members of the Board were committed to implementing several integrated but functional projects in a holistic approach in order to enhance their contribution to national goals of food security, poverty reduction and sustainable resource management. Activities on Environmental Sustainable Resource Management. Activities on Environmental pollution were started in Nairobi and its environs. Activities with ethno-botany, ethno data bases, Epidemiology and community mobilization were carried out in parts of Kenya as need arose. The Board of Directors was in the forefront of ensuring that the performances and projects were properly harmonized in order to minimize duplication. They were working in the field of volunteers.

During the year, THIN was lucky to be offered a blogger, http://dandoracommunity.blogspot.com and a page on Nabuur website http://www.nabuur.com/en/village/dandora and GlobalGiving Kenya http://ggkenya.ning.com and Traditional Healthcare Integration Network page http://thincommunitygroups.ning.com.

THIN is now uploading our blog with the organizations’ strategies events and developments. For example, our detailed THIN INSTITUTION: OUR STRATEGIES. On the blogs also is an “Information line”, to make our work more and more valuable to those who are interested in the welfare and social, economic progress of African Countries.

In view of our revolutionary process of change, both economic and political, in these lands, an understanding of the conditions and problems, and what THIN organization is doing about then is essential to those concerned in these modern and past developments. This is particularly true of those parts of Africa that lie within the tropics and are now in the struggle for development and the growth of humanitarian feeling.

Our blog is profusely illustrated with photographs, and when necessary, maps and diagrams, and will be of great interest to all students of history, culture, tropical medicine, policy, agriculture and general development. We hope that there will be developments in future in these regions and more so on integrated lines.

The Executive Director wishes to thank our Board of Directors, supporters, staff, volunteers and all those trying to see that THIN succeeds.

Dr. Andrew Chapya
Executive Director

ACTIVITIES

A number of implementation challenges, such as inadequate teachers, supervisors, extension workers, facilities, materials and transport were common interruptions and therefore displayed reductions in momentum.

Human Health and Welfare

• Supported improvements in health projects and activities of traditional healers and herbalists.

• Promoted community education and demonstrations that attract and prepare low income individuals for self employment in health occupations with better opportunities.

• Applied research projects and demonstrations on on-going service delivery to improve the targeting of cost-effective delivery.

• Continued to promote school-wide or institutional-wide commitment to population-based research, and core delivery to the entry – of the community based primary healthcare settings, and to effective participation by minority and disadvantaged and other students in health projects

Continued documenting common therapies and used by local populations.

• Continued to promote research and research training, documenting and disseminating information for the protection of the health of the workers and the potential hazards emerging from their activities, through waste disposal, ingestion and environmental chains.

Animal Health and Diseases

• Continued to document veterinary inputs and services available to the poor

• Continued to document animal health diseases and their treatment regimes among the poor in the communities.

• Continued to document major conventional and non-conventional biomass resources available in insufficient qualities that form the basal diets for animals.

• Continued to document common therapies for livestock by local populations.

Environmental Health

• Continued to strengthen agro forestry, seed processing through community education.

• Continued to strengthen alternative energy, renewable resources, services and community education

• Continued to strengthen pollution prevention, environmental degradation, and global warming and climate change through community education

• Continued to strengthen and support seed multiplication systems and processing and passing to farmers and interested community populations

Biodiversity and Natural Resources

• Continued quantifying botanical biodiversity by determining their identification, densely and distribution.

• Continued recording uses, socio-economic values and ecological significance of botanical resources.

• Continued facilitating and coordinating research activities devising strategies for the restoration of degraded sites.

Networking, Partnerships and Collaborations

• Continued to collaborate with National Research and Extension Systems (NARES), which includes national institutes of health, agriculture, universities NGOs especially where the products are clearly international goods.

• Continuing to work with a wide range of collaborators including international research centers, advanced research institutes, policy makers, NGOs, extension agents and community based organizations (CBOs ). To add value through science to methods and products of local research.

• Continued to disseminate information to relevant partners and peers in educating the general public and raising awareness in use of resources and their conservation.

• Continued to support research, research training and development in partnership with local, research institutions.

Agriculture

• Continued to promote systems establishment of high quality seed for development needs (having sources and genetically high quality seeds and appropriate information for identifying, collecting, preparing, evaluating storing and transplanting seeds for various other groups).

• Continued supporting and promoting systems combining cropping with pastures;

• Continued promoting watershed management, rainwater harvesting, testing regeneration (biological) and mechanical techniques(gully control, terrace improvements and slope stabilization to control run-off and channel it to stabilized stream banks.

• Continued supporting village drinking water, gather natural resources inventorying as part of the monitoring to appraise effectiveness and develop tools for watershed and soil management.

• Continued supporting income generating opportunities for poor farmers, landless, labourers, women heading households e.g. cultivation of medicinal, insecticidal and fast growing trees.

• Continued strengthening capacity of local populations and other local organizations, groups and youth to carry out local development projects to improve household food production and consumption.

These projects are assisting communities in the protection and restoration of health, soil, water, forests, marshes and plant resource base upon which the rural population is totally dependant. THIN is starting from what people know and what they are prepared for.

Community Based Herbal Health Clinics

The THIN Herbal Health Clinics projects are meant to look at and find ways of reinforcing the referral interface between community-based care and hospital services, especially for the underprivileged and deprived segments of the Kenyan populations. In addition, the projects are poised to develop into an alternative institution of choice for referral of patients in the communities and beyond, for medical as well as health problems that do not respond to convectional medicines and technologies.

Kenya is a country of cultural societies, and, the cultural traditional expressions that are locale specific and based on the environment are built on health and illness of the people and their communities. By looking closely at these aspects will give THIN an opportunity to develop an important but neglected area of community based health care and services.

THINS’ first community-based herbal health clinic in Dandora Nairobi continued to increasingly offer a range of health services: in parasitic diseases, antibiotic therapy, a wide range of morbidity diseases where many effective herbals are already available.nutritional, (on the first level of care for conditions that do not need hospitalization), as well as medical conditions that are known to respond to supplements and herbals, (primary Medicare) health, health-worker training, health systems research, epidemiology and referrals to Government and private hospitals. A total of four thousand two hundred and seventy eight (4278) cases were diagnosed.

CAPACITY AND INSTITUTONAL BUILDING.

THIN needs capacity to empower communities and their groups themselves to asses and respond to challenges of every day living and to develop and adapt health applications that improve their livelihoods.

THIN need expertise of staff, volunteers, and other workers in multidisciplinary, multi-sectoral, multi-echelon fields to work as researchers (biological, social, information), teachers, extension staff , technicians, among others. The institution needs critical management staff, facilities, equipments, materials, and transportation in order to build sustainable health care and agricultural production and extension systems: to improve operations and cut costs.

THIN Members of the Board and Directors, {MBD} staff and volunteers from the communities made tremendous achievements despite all hurdles by reaching two thousand seven hundred (2700) community groups. A total of 300 healers, 700 small holder farmers and 2500 volunteers recruited. The very successful Female Community Health Volunteers Projects (FCHVP) was created. A dedicated cadre of a total of 5600 unpaid, literate (primary level) village volunteers were recruited and trained in areas that attract and prepare low income individuals for self employment in health occupations.

As funds become available THIN will progressively undertake other aspects of institutional building.

FUNDRAISING

An essential element in planning and implementation of THINS’ projects and programmes is that THIN needs a solid foundation of long-term cOre-support, independent of any direct funding for cooperate programmes or contractual work. To give assurance that it can effectively accomplish its core activities, as well as for cooperative programmes and contractional work that can be grafted on to it.

Over the years, we have tried to diversify and expand our funding base, However, there is the issue of internal constituents in some donor agencies which leaves their partners unsure of how to proceed, serious situations continue to pose a challenge to us.

For example, in several cases cooperation agencies and their Standard Operational Guidelines (SOGS) have failed to recognize that each organization has its own problems requiring unique solutions. Fundraising for THIN by ourselves has tended to be slow, partly of what THIN organization stands for and partly because of the nature of it’s work. And maybe our approaches to donors have not been effective: not exiting or interesting enough. Or the people we have been approaching are not the right people. However, we thank very much those who have given us what we have used and are still willing to give. And also those we are approaching again. But if we look at Africa, for a few moments, we also have to admit, alas, that the sons of the continent themselves are far from escaping the blame of corrupt practices, as well as violations of human rights, especially by those who hold economic and political power.

With adequate funding, at the level where we can implement most of our projects. We can make a great impact within 2-3 years.

Picture: 

Attached files: 

Mbakaya_Recom.pdf

T H I N I N S T I T U T I O N 2009.pdf