Lucie de Clerck has been volunteering for Pesinet since September 2009. She just spent a week in Bamako to contribute to the activities of the organization. She is sharing with us her impressions after this first experience in Mali.

• Why did you want to go to Mali?

I have been involved in the organization for a few months. Up to now I worked on rather “theoretical” tasks such as fundraising, completion of presentations, proposals. Anne and I agreed that it would be really useful for me to go there and get a concrete idea of the work done .

A 30-page document does  provide an overview of the project and the main issues adressed, but it does not capture the real lives of families in Mali,  the work done by Fatoumata (Weighing agent – editor’s note.), or the state of health of little Boubacar. Besides, when working with an organization that has its activities in Mali, without having ever traveled to Africa, you start looking forward to discovering the country!

• What was your mission there?

My objective was to spend time on the field to understand the  practical operations and get familiar with our subscribers. So I went several times on weighing tours with Assetou and Fatoumata, the two Pesinet’s health agents. This gave me a concrete idea of lifestyles of families, how the visits are conducted, and the daily challenges the organization faces. I tried to translate these findings into suggestions on where improvements could be made in the procedures followed by agents in the course of their visits.

I was also responsible for assisting the coordinator in better organizing his work. Together, we made a list of all its tasks and developed a schedule for greater efficiency in its activities.

Finally, we worked with the team’involved in the pilot program on a “marketing” action plan to recruit new subscribers. Again, this required a strong understanding of local culture. In Bamako, advertizements and brochures in the mailboxes are less effective than a town crier announcing public meetings with the leader of the district!

• What do you keep from this experience?

I learned a lot during this trip, which was my first discovery of Africa. Contact with the ground is very important to me, and I was glad to finally put faces to names! I have great memories of
meetings with families. The reputation of Malians being extremely
welcoming has not wavered.

It seems that the approach adopted by Pesinet, which consists in working at local level is the right one. I realized how complex humanitarian issues are, especially when it comes to development. You have to be patient and to be able to question yourself, as well as try not to impose your ways of doing or thinking.  In Mali, the relation to things is fundamentally different from what we know in Europe. People are very much attached to community solidarity and family ties are everywhere. Going to the doctor is not a natural thing, and the concept of prevention that we have in developed countries does not exist. We need to work in the long term with families to develop a system that fits into their culture while transforming their attitude towards healthcare.

This trip was also an opportunity to learn some values  that we have somewhat forgotten in Europe, such as our relationship to nature. As Erik  Orsenna says in Madame Bâ, ” Going to Africa, it’s back to your roots!” At the end of the day, I think that going to Mali for Pesinet was the best way in which I could have discovered this country.

• How do you see the future?

For Pesinet, focusing on coaching and building capacity of  the employees managing the program. The aim of the organization is to create a local system funded by local funds and managed by local employees in the medium term. For this, we must put priority this year on the consolidation of the pilot project and its development. This requires significant investment in human resources, recruiting others resources on the project to train the actors on the field, but also for technological developments.

For me … another trip to Mali, for sure!

• Some pictures from Lucie’s field mission: