Jerry cans and sweet potatoes help families cope with El Niño drought

Friday, July 8, 2016

Hariwa Billy is just over 100 years old, according to his sons and relatives, the oldest living person in his community. He walks by, white head and all, supporting himself with both hands on a green shoulder height walking stick and looks for a spot of sunlight to perch himself on the still wet grass.

While he can still see like an hawk, hearing is a problem for Hariwa. His eldest son Alex speaks loudly into his ear before he can hear and respond.

They have to fetch water from the nearest river, which is in a ravine and not too healthy as there are villagers living upstream. The 20L jerry can keeps Hariwa's water cool over a number of days and it saves Steven the effort to get water for his father on a daily basis. He received the can from World Vision following the El Nino and dry spell which is affecting food gardens and water sources in the Highlands and coastal communities of Papua New Guinea.

El Nino information education and communication cards and a 90-day supply of more than 25,000 water purification tablets and aqua tablets were also distributed with the jerry cans. World Vision has already distributed nearly 4,000 jerry cans (20L) in Hela and Southern Highlands Provinces and 3,000 jerry cans (20L) distributed in Madang and Morobe under its El Niño Preparedness, Response and Recovery Project.

“Men, women including girls and boys were oriented of the basic sanitation and hygiene concepts, particularly during the onset of drought, which included proper and effective hand washing, use of clean and covered water containers, safe drinking through boiling or purification, water conservation and proper waste management. The WASH orientation activity is being done before the actual distribution of water containers and water purification tablets. It is during this activity that community members are oriented on how to properly use the aqua tabs,” said Bonie Belonia, World Vision PNG El Niño Response Manager.

Hariwa and his family will also benefit from World Vision's distribution of drought tolerant sweet potato cuttings and portable flour mills to be distributed in the Southern Highlands Province project area in partnership with the government's National Agricultural Research Institute (NARI).

The response teams are also working closely with the local government agricultural agency, the PNG NARI to acquire drought and frost tolerant planting materials. Based on the needs assessment conducted earlier, drought affected communities need sweet potato and cassava-planting materials to restart production as both are considered food and cash crops.

A total of 165,330 cuttings of sweet potato and 11,192 cuttings of cassava are to be distributed across 34 communities in Madang, Morobe, Southern Highlands, and Hela Province. The training and distribution is expected to benefit at least 5,211 households impacting a total population of 22,911.

Community preparations are underway to ensure that community members are organised and prepared for the distribution this month.

World Vision PNG’s El Niño Response projects aims to increase communities’ access to basic sanitation, access to safe water and for vulnerable women, men, girls and boys to be provided with life-saving assistance in conflict and crisis situation.