By Helen Blakesley

You could call Jean-Philippe Debus an emergency action man. He’s often one of the first humanitarian workers to arrive on the scene of a crisis — whether natural disaster or manmade conflict. It’s his job to advise, to guide and to help provide those in need with the necessities, like clean water to drink or a safe place to bathe.

Jean Philippe Debus supervises the construction of latrines at a displaced persons site in Burkina Faso’s capital, Ouagadougou, in 2009. Photo by Lane Hartill/CRS

Lately, he’s been spending a lot of his time in the Sahel, the swathe of land covering several countries in Africa, just below the Sahara desert. There’s a food crisis brewing there, added to which, rebel violence in Mali has forced many thousands of people to flee their homes in search of safety in neighboring countries. Jean-Philippe has been in the thick of CRS’ work to help those refugees who’ve crossed the border into Burkina Faso and Niger. He shared with us what it’s like to be on the humanitarian ”front line”.

The first thing you have to think about in an emergency response is how to connect directly with the people. Since we’re dealing with human suffering, it’s very important for me to deal directly with people with as few barriers as possible. Of course, there’s often the language barrier, which can be a challenge. Communication is essential in our work. There’s the ‘technical’ side where we basically help provide what people need to survive — shelter, water, sanitation, hygiene, health and food aid. But then we also have to think about people’s well-being, their mental state, and this requires communication and understanding. So that’s why it’s our first concern.
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Keddo Umar is one of more than 302,000 people to take part in the CRS Productive Safety Net Program in Ethiopia. Photo by David Snyder for CRS

Imagine you lived in Ethiopia, where millions of people like Keddo do not know where their next meal will come from. Before they could rely on their farms to provide much needed food to eat and to sell, but increasingly unreliable rains have changed this. Now many families must sell precious household items like their chickens or goats just to get through the hungry season. They are increasingly trapped in a cycle of poverty and hunger.

But imagine that something simple could be done to help people like Keddo.
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A vendor signs information at a CRS seed fair in Seko, Central African Republic. CRS piloted a barcode tracking system in CAR in June 2011 as a more efficient and effective way to register and track beneficiaries and vendors. Photo by Sandra Basgall/CRS

Sandra Basgall turned seventy a few weeks ago. But there’s no easy chair in sight for this Colorado-born CRS staffer. Sandra’s an advisor on monitoring and evaluation for the Central Africa Region, lives in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and is still very much in on the action. She’s lived in 15 different US states and 6 different countries, but home is wherever she lays her hat. “I don’t look back and think ‘oh I wish I was there again’. I just look forward and think ‘where am I going to go next and what am I going to do next?’”

Technology has never held any fear for Sandra. She touched her first computer in 1982. “The woman who was teaching us was maybe a week ahead of our lessons”. Since then she’s moved with the times … she started typing her Masters thesis on an electric typewriter before graduating to a huge word processing system that took up most of the office. By the time she was writing her Ph.D, she was on a laptop computer—albeit a 22-pound one, which looked like a portable sewing machine…
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Cécile Mujawayezu is a nurse at Bungwe Health Centre, one of the partner sites of the AIDSRelief program. She’s been counseling 12-year-old Jean-Claude about his HIV status. Photo by Helen Blakesley/CRS

Cécile is talking to Séraphine about her medicine. Séraphine is HIV positive. She lost her husband to the virus and is now bringing up their six kids in Bungwe, a village high in the hills of northern Rwanda.

A senior nurse at Bungwe Health Center, Cécile used to have to wait for a doctor to come to start people on antiretroviral therapy and conduct more complex medical evaluations—and those visits are only once a week. But now she can handle it by herself. She’s had the training courtesy of the Ministry of Health.

It’s just one of the changes since the center became an AIDSRelief site in 2005. Catholic Relief Services leads the consortium that runs the AIDSRelief program, which is funded by the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
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A CRS team distributes emergency food in Mopti, Mali to people who have fled their homes due to separatist violence in the North of the country. Photo by CRS Staff

Unrest and uncertainty are continuing in the West African state of Mali, as rebel separatist forces have taken control of the northern desert region. Interim civilian power has been restored in the capital, Bamako, after last month’s military coup, but Mali’s political future is still unclear. Violence in the north continues and many thousands of people are still fleeing their homes – either to move further south or to cross the borders into neighboring countries. CRS remains committed to serve the people of Mali and to continue its relief and development work there.

Timothy Bishop, CRS country representative in Mali has stayed at his post in Bamako throughout the crisis. He talked to us about the reopening of one of CRS’ offices and how CRS is leading the way in providing help for those displaced by the violence.

Two weeks ago CRS’ office in Mopti was temporarily closed. Why has it now re-opened?
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A woman signs her information form on an smart phone at a CRS seed fair in Kaga Bandoro, Central African Republic. CRS tested a barcode tracking system in June 2011 to see if it was a more efficient and effective way to register and track people helped by the agency. Photo by Sandra Basgall/CRS

By Helen Blakesley

What brings together more than 170 people, from 5 continents, 34 countries and over 64 organizations, in a room in a hotel in the Rwandan capital of Kigali? Speed dating. Seriously. But all in the name of technology and development.

I feel I should explain. If we were going from table to table listening to someone’s alluring spiel, it was because we were at the 4th CRS Global ICT4D Conference, discovering the latest innovations in Information Communications and Technology for Development.

I’d been dispatched to the conference with instructions to “unleash my inner geek”. My concern was, did I have one? I own nothing prefixed with an ‘i’. I’m a firm believer that you can’t beat the feel and smell of a real book between your hands and I’ve never downloaded a song in my life. My techie credentials were not looking good. Still, off I went, to explore this new frontier, with absolutely no idea what to expect.
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Sean Callahan, CRS executive vice president for overseas operations, recently traveled to South Sudan to witness first-hand the state of the new nation and Catholic Relief Services’ work there. Here are some of his reflections on peace and the role of the Church:

When South Sudan gained independence from its northern neighbor last year, it was a moment of tremendous victory for the new nation. But nine months after secession, the country—counted among the most impoverished in the world—continues to face significant challenges.
Tensions and violence on the border with Sudan remain, especially in the areas of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, and the border itself has not yet been demarcated. In recent weeks, there have been concerns over oil revenue, with the South accusing the North of stealing its oil—subsequently shutting down all production. Since this is the major source of income for the government of South Sudan, it has put into place austerity measures, which could hamper development efforts.
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“It takes a trained eye to see when someone is poorer than poor in Niger. People are living in a harsh environment, it’s a semi-desert, many households can seem badly off at the best of times. But this year, I noticed a change,” said Jean-Marie Adrian, Catholic Relief Services regional director for West Africa.

“A very simple thing struck me. Usually, during the dry season, people weave straw together to make new granaries or they repair the holes in their old ones. But as I drove past villages this time, I saw very few of these new circular constructions. Many had collapsed, with no effort to repair them … because there had been no harvest that needed storing.”
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A camp for internally-displaced persons in Somalia. Photo courtesy of a local CRS partner

CRS is working through local partners in Somalia as it begins to recover from a devastating drought. Here is a post from a member of one of them. For security reasons, we cannot identify the blogger or the partner. The first post is here.

“Why are they shooting?” I screech and dive to the floor. The other men are laughing; this is my first trip to Mogadishu.

“Oh my brother!” the driver shouts over the machine gun clatter, “There is a traffic jam. This way is more effective than a horn.”
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A camp for internally-displaced persons in Somalia. An estimated 1.5 million Somalis have been displaced within the country due to drought, famine and war. Photo courtesy of a local CRS partner

CRS is working through local partners in Somalia as it begins to recover from a devastating drought. Here is a post from a member of one of them. For security reasons, we cannot identify the blogger or the partner.

Somalias are infinite.

There is the Somalia of Adel, who owns twenty camels with tasseled saddles; he rides across the sand with his cousins and brothers and a cluster of long-horned cattle, rising up and down and up like a fleet of tiny ships.
There is the Somalia of Wa’ail, who slipped away from the village in the cool of early morning and walked two weeks to find a school. Now he can read. “I would write home and tell them,” he says. “But there is no one to answer.”
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