We are the Babbs family. Sue, Simon & Matthew visited Madagascar in July 2014. We fell in love with the country, people and wildlife, and keep returning!
This is the final report from the St James the Less / France team. We are amazed by how many areas of the life of the Diocese of Toliara we were able to touch in just under three weeks. We invite you all to look at your skills, talents, and interests to see if you could help the Diocese too.
Marcy Allen, Sue Babbs, Emily Nell Lagerquist, Jacky Lowe, and Maggie Simmons meet monthly on Zoom with Reverend Nolavy, Mlle Harisoa and the Women's Center Committee. All but Marcy were in Toliara in July, and it was wonderful to be able to meet with the women in person.
It was an exciting visit, as the June and July mission trip teams had brought with them items to make Days for Girls (DfG) washable reusable menstrual kits, including: 1561 cloth drawstring bags, 5316 DfG shields 3175 DfG liners
These had been sewn by women in northern Illinois, USA. The women in Toliara were paid to sew the other items needed to make complete DfG kits. While we were there we helped unpack the 13 rolling duffles. So far 2128 regular size kits, and 111 heavyflow kits have been assembled, with more sewing of the outstanding kit parts planned in the near future.
Maggie went with Rev Nolavy, Mlle Harisoa and Mme Josianne to distribute some of these kits in Saint Luke's church, Ankilifaly on Friday afternoon.
The happy recipients of the Days for Girls distribution!
Since March, we have all been discussing the idea of developing the Diocese's own menstrual kits, which will be called Freedom Pads. This has evolved from feedback from the women on improvements they wanted to make to the DfG kits. The DfG kits work better for girls than for women. Sue developed new patterns for longer products (to reduce leakage), and we sampled different backing fabrics to reduce the products slipping in the women's panties. Many years ago DfG replaced plastic bags with sewn waterproof bags in kits, but still kept large drawnstring bags to contain everything. So smaller, neater bags, using less fabric were also sampled. These will be made in two sizes, one for girls' kits and one for womens' kits.
The women test the various new products over the intervening months, and came to the meeting on Thursday morning to report on what they had discovered. Various further improvements were suggested, and will be sewn and tested, until everyone is satisfied with the new Freedom Pads. It was wonderful to be able to talk freely with the women and hear their feedback, and feel that we are moving towards a better product.
The local maternity clinics have also asked us to make kits totally in white, which will enable the medical staff to better assess the loss of blood after birth. This would not be allowed using DfG kits, so this is another step forward.
We also discussed the new teaching materials which we will then need. It has been decided that in the next few months, Dr Avril and midwife, Tantely, will join with Rev Nolavy, Mlle Harisoa and Sue Babbs to prepare new training material for
girls who have not yet started menstruating
girls who are just starting their periods
women and girls who have been menstruating for a while
women who are pre-menopausal, and women who are going through the menopause.
Once these materials have been accomplished we will then consider preparing other materials on information for men and boys, childcare, family health etc.
We then moved on to teaching the women how to use the new cutting mats, quilting rulers and rotary cutters. This will enable the women to more easily, quickly and accurately cut fabrics for the menstrual kits. When they have bought some craft knives, they can also use this approach to cutting paper for bead making or quilling.
In the afternoon, and on Saturday morning, we worked on cloth baby diapers. The women had asked Sue earlier this year to research a pattern for them. They are very excited to make these as they think there will be a good market for them.
Rev Nolavy will be trialling the diapers and liners on her baby, Fahasoavana. We are hoping that terry towelling will make good liners, as this can readily be bought at the local market.
Pray for us to find a source of waterproof fabric which has attractive patterns.
On Friday morning, Maggie was able to step in for Sue who was ill, and teach the making of cords for cinctures (the rope worn by clergy and others over the cassock alb).
Again this was something the women had asked to learn, and Sue had been able to find a good video on YouTube which Maggie had already watched, and had downloaded to her laptop.
Maggie also spent time with Harisoa setting up a new laptop for the Women's Center and Fiadanana (Toliara Child coordinator) to help him understand how to use the new software for child sponsorship.
On Sunday, Sue was installed as a Lay Canon at the Cathedral.
The women had sewed this beautiful cope for her.
As Lay Canons, Sue & John Griffin are invited to Chapter meetings, and have varied responsibilities in the Diocese for communications, work with the women, finances, economic development and child sponsorship.
After Maggie & Sue had left, Jacky continued with her teaching of cookery to the women, encouraging them this year to use the gas stove in the inside kitchen.
Their latest session involved making pizza bases and topping them with sauted vegetables, sauce and cheese.
They also crushed peanuts in a pestle and mortar and added them to cooked pumpkin to make a nutritious meal with rice.
Neny Holy (Bishop Samitiana's wife) reports that the Diocesan Mothers' Union conference at Manja was a great success, with so many practical messages for the spirit, mind and body.
For example one of the member is a dentist, so everybody now knows better how to brush their teeth in order to avoid toothache!!!! Also Emma Gibbons from Reef Doctor came to talk about mangrove restoration.
We had lots of fun, dance and singing with the Mothers' Union members from all three Archdeaconeries, including women from some of the very newest churches. THANK YOU LORD!!!
If you found this newsletter helpful, please forward it to your friends and invite them to subscribe too. Thank you! Click here to subscribe
Paul Simmons (member of Friends of Toliara leadership team) writes:
One of the impressions from my first visit to SW Madagascar in 2016 was that the region has a number of serious ecological problems due to the pressure on people to survive. The main one is the destruction of the forest. If you are a farmer, drought or blight comes and crops fail, so you live off the forest, and maybe burn a stretch to graze your zebu, or plant some crop in the ash-enriched soil. You need to cook so you buy charcoal made from the forest timber. You build your house from wood cut from the forest. Toliara province is dry, and rain is irregular. Drought frequency and severity has increased in recent years due to climate change. The pre-human vegetation is mainly the spiny forest, dominated by didierea trees and baobabs. During one Friends of Toliara meeting, we discussed the devastation of the forest evident from an arial map survey comparison and the Bishop lamented how much the forest has been destroyed in his lifetime.
Deforestation in the Toliara region, 1985-2016
Last September we heard about a charity planting mangroves in Madagascar. Mangrove forest occurs along much of the west coast of the province, which may have one advantage over other forests, in that their brackish marine environments may be less susceptible to drought and climate change. In fact, this turns out to be complicated, since most mangrove species do need some fresh water, and climate change powered cyclones and sea level rises pose threats to their physical environment. Nevertheless, mangrove forests provide numerous advantages to a community, including protection of the coast from cyclone damage as well as providing an important food supply, especially fish which are a major source of protein in the area. Several of the coastal fishing villages in mangrove areas have Episcopal (EEM) churches, so Bishop Samy proposed we work with them in order to help protect the mangroves in their area.
After trying several mangrove research organizations, we made contact with Emma Gibbons, Head science officer at Reefdoctor https://www.reefdoctor.org/ which works on a mangrove reserve north of Toliara, near Ambondrolava. Emma explained that sustainable mangrove planting will only work with the cooperation of the community, so we developed a plan to involve the local EEM churches and their villages by first raising awareness.
On 10 July, Paul and Ialy Cael (Diocesan Economic Development Coordinator) took 20 members of the EEM churches in Mangily, Belaza and Ankilibe to visit the reserve in Ambondrolava.
We were given a guided tour by the president of the association. He explained they have 7 of the 8 Madagascar mangrove species in the reserve. They also have about 70 wetland bird species, the highest recorded wetland bird diversity in the region.
We explained the benefits of mangroves to the participants:
More fish and crabs, since the mangroves provide food, shelter, and spawning ground for these.
Fruit and leaves for food and medicine
Flowers for bees – potentially locals can make top quality mangrove-blossom honey.
Protection to the coast from cyclone waves and storm surges
Protection to the coral reefs and sea grass from land runoff
Potentially a sustainable source of excellent quality construction timber and firewood (although currently it is illegal to cut for this purpose)
Benefit to the world by absorbing greenhouse gases – mangroves are very effective in this
The ecosystem supports a wide biodiversity including plants, birds, and animals which may interest tourists
The ecosystem is a beautiful thing for the locals to enjoy
God made the mangrove ecosystem and saw that it was good. He made man to look after it (Genesis 2.15). He is not happy if we let it be destroyed.
Most of the visiting church members were very engaged and grew enthusiastic. They wanted to know what they could do to help.
On 11 July Paul, Ialy and Emily Nell Lagerquist (another Friends of Toliara Leader) visited the mangrove site at Belaza.
M. Gilbert Mandily (president of the local mangrove association) gave us a guided visit.
The mangrove forest here and in Ankilibe has suffered a lot more damage than at Ambondrolava, and needs restoration. There are only 3 species (Afiafy, Tangabe, and Sangora) and many trees have been cut or looted, reportedly by charcoal makers from the south who sell the charcoal in Toliara. The police turn a blind eye. We visited the foreshore where there is a large area which could be planted.
The site seemed ideal. Furthermore, there was going to be a low tide around midday on World Mangrove Day, July 26. The next steps were to obtain the appropriate authorisation and co-operation, the right propagules (baby mangroves), planting expertise, and security backing. Emma Gibbons invited Bishop Samy, Paul, Emily Nell, Ialy and M. Bienaimé to lunch at her house (3km north of Ifaty) on Tuesday July 15.
We planned a planting at Belaza on World Mangrove Day to take place in parallel with an event at Ambondrolava. Reefdoctor provided the propagules, technical and security backing, and the church and village provided the site and the manpower.
Emily Nell was present at the Belaza event, along with 51 adults and numerous children from the local community. It was a success, and a good first step to having a thriving mangrove forest on this stretch of the coast, giving people food and beauty, and giving God glory.
If you found this newsletter helpful, please forward it to your friends and invite them to subscribe too. Thank you! Click here to subscribe
