International Board Visits The Mentawai To Review Programs and Direction

SurfAid's International Board (IB) held its annual field meeting in the Mentawai Islands in Marsh, reviewing the programs and setting the future course of the organization, which is now eight years old.

Board members Steve Hathaway (chairman), Ray Wilson, Harry Hodge and Paul Riehle were all able to make the trip while Santiago Aguerre unfortunately had to make a last-minute withdrawal due to illness. All donate their time voluntarily to SurfAid.

Senior management staff in attendance included CEO Dr Dave Jenkins, who also sits on the International Board, Chief Operations Officer Andrew Judge, Program Director Alan Rogerson and Country Director Bart Rombaut. 

Chairman Steve Hathaway said the board was impressed by progress in the various program areas.

“The Emergency Preparedness Program (E-Prep) has become a core SurfAid International (SAI) activity and agreed milestones are clearly being met. Systematic documentation is providing strong feedback to stakeholders on all aspects of the E-Prep program,” he said.

“The Malaria Free Mentawai Program has recently achieved the milestone of 22,000 nets and malaria education being delivered to 75% of the 70,000 villagers in three of the four Mentawai Islands and this is a remarkable achievement in what is an extremely challenging geographical region.

“The final Sipora Island distribution to a further 8,000 villagers will begin in July, which will mean more than 85% of the Mentawai population will be reached.”

Hathaway said the Water and Sanitation Program (WatSan) had made good progress against milestones. “Sixty-nine WatSan facilities (including wells and associated water delivery systems) have now been completed in Nias since 2006, after the devastating 2005 earthquake, with the aim of more than 90 by the end of June.

“And in the Community Based Health Program (CBHP), field experience gained over the last six months is helping us to implement Care Groups in a more participative manner and achieve better delivery of health messages. A monitoring system to track the health and nutrition of every child in our CBHP villages is being put in place and individual records will provide much needed data on the impact of the program over time.”

During the course of the trip, the IB visited several villages to see SurfAid’s work, including the village of Berimanua that was so badly damaged in the September earthquakes that the community has now abandoned it, fearing further earthquakes and a possible tsunami.

“The lifeblood of SAI is its people and the IB had the privilege to meet many of our Tua Pejat-based Indonesian staff during the course of the IB meeting and also were able to observe their work firsthand during a visit to Pukarayat village to see a Care Group in action,” Hathaway said.

“A visit to the Katiet Village Program on the last day of the meeting further reinforced the faith of the IB in our frontline people. Overall the meeting confirmed to all who attended that the passion that drives SurfAid remains alive and well.”