UPDATES!!!

This week Mike and I attended the ECOWAS Nutrition Forum. It is a nutriton forum held to share and learn from all the West African countries. There were about 13 countries represented. Different topics were discussed dealing with the causes of malnutrition. We learned that many underlying issues that may not have anything to do directly with food are causing food insecurity in Sierra Leone. A major problem is the roads. Because of the poor condition of the roads, produce spoils before it can be transported throughout the country. So even though Sierra Leone harvests enough food to sustain itself, it is not even close to providing food security to the people throughout the country. The conference as a whole was very interesting. It is beneficial to bring many different countries together in order to learn from eachother and unite in finding the best way to provide nutrition for countries that have such high rates of malnutrition and other hunger related problems.


Today Mike and I went hiking with a hiking group in Freetown. Every Saturday morning they hike in a different area of Freetown or in the outskirts of Freetown. Today we hiked along Whale River. Despite the rain during the entire hike, we discovered another beautiful area of Sierra Leone.

We found out Friday that we are going to be able to pick up our NGO application on Tuesday! This is huge, because it is the last step in the process to become an officially registered NGO in the country!! To say the least, we are pumped!!

We will be going up country to Taiama to operate the nutrition clinic on Friday.
We are opening nutrition clinic next Saturday. It is a village about 12 miles away from Taiama called Taninihun. This is a village that the Taiama local healthcare workers discovered as having an extremely high rate of malnutrition among children under five. We ask for your prayers as we work with the Taiama healthcare workers in expanding the program.