On May 4, join CREATE! for a Solar Pumps for Senegal Fundraiser--Details Below

These women need a solar water pump.

Like village women all over Senegal,  they walk long distances every day to pull water one bucket at a time from wells that are as much as 150 feet deep.

CREATE! wants to change that, by installing solar pumps that will provide much needed water for these women and their families.

We're also working with local communities to expand and rehabilitate village wells and water networks; build low cost cisterns for in-ground water collection and storage; and establish cooperative community vegetable gardens and tree nurseries that make efficient use of available water.

Join us on Wednesday, May 4, from 6-8 pm at Tsunami Books, 2585 Willamette Street in Eugene, for an inspiring and informative evening to raise money for Solar Pumps for Senegal.

For more information, email us at create@createaction.org, call us at 541-335-9941.

If you're not able to join us you can still donate online by clicking the "Donate Now" button on our blog or website.

Thank you!

A son of Senegal.

We are so fortunate to have as our CREATE! Country Director Kebe Ibrahima, truly a son of the region.

Kebe grew up in these villages, speaks the language of our beneficiaries, and has walked in their shoes.

His experience and commitment to humanitarian work, social mobilization and rural community development have already proven invaluable.

Welcome home, Kebe, and thank you.

The fruits of our labor.

We can hardly believe that just a few months ago the land that produced these eggplants looked like this:

It wasn't easy, but with all of us working together, clearing and weeding and watering, we made a garden grow where before there had been only grass.

We carried the water on our heads, and our babies on our backs, and gratitude in our hearts for the harvest that we would enjoy.

There is much more to do, but for now, we pause to celebrate and to share with you the fruits of our labor.

We thank you for your support.  We could not have done it without you.

CREATE! is in the news.

We're excited to see that the word about CREATE! is spreading, from the Senegalese villages of Fass Kane, Ouadior, Ouarkokhokh and Ndiaakhaye to the American cities of Austin, Chicago, Boston and Portland.

This article has just appeared in Sustainable Business Oregon:

Texas-based SpawGlass helps fund sustainability in Africa

We thank the SpawGlass Corporation, their foundation and employees for reaching out to help us in our efforts to help people make a better life for themselves and their families.

Three hundred kilos of eggplant!

Apparently the eggplant that Madame Toutane is displaying in the photo below is just one of 300 kilos--more than 600 pounds--of eggplant that her group has already harvested and sent to market from the land that they have cultivated with the help of CREATE!

The women say, "Last year we were sitting and doing nothing, and now look!"

What's the difference?

Water, water, and more water--in two reservoirs that the community members dug and finished with their own hands, on land donated by the community, using materials and guidance provided by CREATE!


Exciting news....stay tuned for more news and photos as Barry continues his reports from the field.

"Your project is different."

Like many poor people the world over, Toutane Diagne has seen aid projects with grand ambitions come to her village, only to close up shop and leave before their goals were accomplished.

But Madame Toutane says that CREATE! is different.

She says that this is not the first time the people in her village have tried to work together to solve problems, but that in the past "we tried but stopped because of lack of resources."

She goes on to say, "When you came, we were hesitant at first, but then we realized that your project was different.  And we were not wrong. Thanks to your action, we are harvesting. Now our aim is to grow all kinds of trees and vegetables.  And we know that we will succeed, because CREATE! is showing us how to help ourselves in small ways. We know that anything is possible."

Harvesting hope.

These women are members of a group organized in the community of Fass in northern Senegal.  With guidance from CREATE! this group took advantage of the short rainy season to plant eggplants and melons in their community garden, and they have now begun to reap the benefits of their efforts.

The women say that the harvest gives them hope, and that CREATE! is different from other organizations that have come to their village because of the ways in which we have involved the community in planning and implementing projects very quickly. 

Toutane Diagne, one of the elders of the group, says “It is important for us to make this project successful through our own efforts.  We cannot expect donors just to give us things, and CREATE! encourages us to mobilize even small contributions from the community to meet our own needs.  For example, when we decided to build a reservoir, the community provided the labor and CREATE! contributed cement, chicken wire and iron bars.  Now we have a beautiful reservoir and everybody is happy.  We wish that god will bless you and our operation.”