The Meru Women's Self Help Group (MWSHG)
Building Flour Mills, Water Tanks and Anti-Elephant Fences
The Meru Women's Self Help Group
About four hours drive south of Archer's Post, in the central highlands town of Meru, the putt-putt-putt of the flourmill signals the start of a new day. Within minutes, the putting turns to loud grinding, letting women know that business has started. Inside the one-room cement structure, an elderly woman stands barefoot, using all her strength to wind a giant metal arm on the side of the machine. Her arthritic hands grasp the crank and her body heaves to keep the mill running. She is a member of the Meru Women's Self Help Group (MWSHG), which owns this mill.
Since the group was formed in 1982, it has grown from 35 members to 75 members ranging in age from 28 to 80. They joined together to create this posho mill. Posho is corn ground into flour and then made into bread or mixed with water to create ugali (a stew-like substance made of mashed potatoes, spinach, corn and peas), a staple of the Kenyan diet. Under the leadership of Florence Imathiu, the members saved up to buy the mill and first housed it in Florence's home because they had no other place. Soon after, they approached the government and requested a plot of land. The government obliged, and the women then built a small structure to house the mill plus another building, which serves as a kitchen. Here they bake 100 loaves of bread each day to sell.
Because the women must pick corn daily and since hand- grinding it into flour takes hours, the mill is a godsend. Women now bring their corn to the mill and it is turned into flour in minutes. The group charges five to 30 shillings — somewhere between a dime and 50 cents — per bucket, depending on size, and use the profit for mill maintenance.
"Women need to support other women. Then you can see development and then you can move ahead together," says Florence, 58. "In our group, we all sit, we listen, we discuss and we come together with one answer." Currently, the main topic of discussion is the difficulty of operating the posho mill. "It is manually run and that is very hard work. Our next goal is to have it start automatically," explains Florence, her eyes lighting up. The group's members now pipe water into the mill from a spring that Florence's husband discovered in a nearby forest. This same water source will serve as their electrical energy one day. The women are patient. They know that their vision will take years. Nothing gets done quickly in Kenya.
The group has also undertaken a water tank project. Started 10 years ago, Meru now has one massive water tank, built solely by the women of this group. It has saved women hours of walking every day to fetch clean water. "We are no longer animals drinking from the river," declares Florence. "The water now comes to us." The group is currently building three more tanks, which will all be connected to the spring to supply local farms with water.
The tank has allowed girls to spend more time at school rather than helping their mothers fetch water. It has also increased the safety of young girls. There is a high incidence of sexual assaults on girls in rural areas. Many are raped while walking alone in desolate areas to fetch water. Some girls, as young as eight, must wander for miles by themselves to the nearest clean water source. Legally, raping a girl under the age of 14 is considered "defilement" in Kenya, which comes with a lesser penalty of five years imprisonment as opposed to a life sentence for rape.
The Kenyan field office of Save the Children Canada has been working with women's groups like this one since 1990. Through its Water and Sanitation Project, women are able to build water storage tanks to harvest rainwater from roof catchments in their homes. To date, 2,000 water tanks have been constructed in the homes of participating women's group members. In 1998, the Kithigiri Women's Group, also in the Meru district, partnered with Save the Children Canada and put up 25 water jars for roof water catchments.
The Meru group has also solved the elephant problem. For years, Kenyan women have complained to the government about the havoc wrought by destructive elephants that ruin subsistence crops of corn, wheat, vegetables and fruit. Over 75 per cent of deaths caused by wildlife in Kenya are from elephants trampling people who are trying to protect their crops. Yet despite demonstrations by women's groups across the country, the government remains unable to solve the problem of conserving crops as well as elephants. So the Meru women's group decided to take matters into their own hands.
First, they came up with a plan for a solar-powered fence that would span the radius of their community's fields. Next, they raised enough money within their group to buy supplies needed for the construction of the fence. Finally they pulled up their skirts and started building it. Today the fence, made of wood and wire, is 30 km long and still growing. The group has now employed men to repair any damage while female group members oversee the work. Dickson Kungania, the grown son of member Grace, says, "Women are not only creating jobs for themselves but also for men. The role of the women in this area is so important."
Reverend Lawi Imathiu, a world-renowned retired Methodist bishop and Florence's husband, is a firm supporter of his wife's group. "Society has it that women are better organized than men," he says. "Women get into groups easier than men. If you go back 20 years, there was resistance from men towards women's initiatives. The men would complain. But today, it's expected the woman of a house will be meeting with other women because they are hands-on people." He adds, "Despite the oppression of women, when they bring ideas to the table, a man will not say no."
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