ETHIOPIA|Social and economic development, promotion and protection of Konso special woreda cultural heritage

The project promotes the social and economic development of the area through the involvement of local communities, by intervening on educational, health and environmental fields of the 8 villages and by intervening on protection of cultural heritage and on promotion of activities which create income, particularly addressed to women and young people.

The Konso Special Woreda is one of the poorest areas of Ethiopia. Lack of education and health supplies joined with lack of attention for the cultural and environmental heritage, create a critical situation. The classrooms of the few schools of Konso territory have a variable number of students from 70 to 90 and the most part of these students have not books. Teachers have never follow refresher and requalification course, there’s a very strong lack of school furniture and training aid.

In school field the project plans the requalification of two high schoolhouses of Karat and Fasha, which each contain around 2.000 students; the building-up of two village-school in Mechelo and Gesergyo for around 700 students; the building-up of 3 spaces for literacy and reading in Sawgame, Debana and Darra, for around 1.000 students; the making of 3 training and refresher sessions for teachers of the areas, 80 people.

In health field the most part of villages have not water supplies (and when they exist are insufficient to satisfy local needs) and very often the (few) available wellsprings are very distant from villages and usually they offer not drinking water in the dry season, causing intestinal diseases which provoke a very high mortality rate, specially in very young children. The collecting and the transport of water is only-women task - especially girls – and to do this, they do not follow the school. The suggested interventions intended to improve the water quality and the access to wellsprings. The project plan the renovation of two wells for water collecting in villages of Dokatu and Sawgame, for around 8.000 people; a feasibility study useful to identify possible modes of building of a pipe which from the perennial source of Fujuja, might carry water to Karat and surrounding villages; the building of a rain water collecting system, for each of two high schools of Karat and Fasha.

Inhabitants of Konso Special Woreda are not aware about environmental and cultural problems and due to high population growth, they are obligated to exploit indiscriminately natural resources of the area. To this is added the need of developing, in a sustainable way, the area’s tourist potential involving local communities in cultural and environmental heritage valorization of Konso. Although tourist potential of area are elevated, a strong support to sector is necessary: hotel offer is insufficient and internal connections are lacking; training of local tourist operators is important. Finally is necessary to enhance on the one hand cultural resources represented by local handcraft and popular traditions and on the other hand environmental characteristics with the support to environmentally-friendly naturalistic activities.

Training activities oriented toward young people and women planned by the project are directed to building of cooperatives (of craftsmen, of services) suited to improve economic level of families. Other training activities are intended to support the institutional reinforcement of local counterpart and Konso Special Woreda, in order to overcome some technical, organizational and management lacks. Moreover, other activities are intended to form and making aware of local population about the importance of their cultural and natural heritage, in order to contribute to solve the serious disinformation about Konso culture and lack of valorization of area.

The project plans the setting- up of three information and making aware campaigns about environmental education and the importance of own cultural heritage; the setting-up of promotional campaign of “Konso tourist product” nearby sector specialized operators; a cycle of preliminary training addressed to trainers; 3 training and refresher sessions addressed to members of local partner, officers of the Ethiopian Ministry of Culture and bringing young people into a cooperative which has to deal with management activities of the Museum of the village and tourism; the making of a cooperative which has to deal with management activities of the Museum of the village, of a female cooperative which has to realize and to market local hand-crafted products (wooden, fabric and clay products) and of a cooperative which has to deal with the external spread, out of Konso territory, of plumbing techniques and farm lands leveling typical of the area