USAID / Malawi - Success Stories

USAID/Development Alternatives Inc.

The Community Partnerships for Sustainable Resource Management Project (COMPASS) activity in Malawi is designed to target people and institutions engaged in community-based natural resource management initiatives at national, district and local levels.

COMPASS awarded its first small grants in January 2000. To date 36 awards totaling $420,000 have been obligated. Of these 25 are directly to community-based organizations. Support targeted directly to community-based organizations provides a very effective means to deliver development funds to beneficiaries. COMPASS has funded a wide variety of activities such as: Communal herbal gardens in Chiradzulu.

A grant of $15,000 was awarded to Hope Humana People to People (an international non-profit organization) in July 2000 to establish community herbal gardens in 34 villages in Chiradzulu District. Community groups have established nurseries on land donated by local chiefs and distribute a wide variety of indigenous tree seedlings and herbs that have medicinal properties to needy households. About 340 people (over 70% of them women) are involved in establishing the nurseries and herbal gardens. They are being trained in harvesting, processing and administering the products. As many as 3,000 people are likely to benefit. From the point of view of improved management of natural resources, this approach will relieve pressure on the remaining natural woodlands. From the point of view of the local communities, some basic herbal remedies and dietary supplements that would otherwise be unaffordable are available to rural families for their own use and for sale.

Given to the recent profusion of "quack" or magical remedies for AIDS, the project staff has repeatedly stressed that such traditional medicines should never be regarded as alternatives to the antibiotics and other drugs that are essential for relieving the suffering of AIDS patients and treating other illnesses. Nevertheless, they can be valuable supplements.

USAID/ Malawi- Success Stories