Valk Welding: Gambia

What is the link between a new housing project Serekunda and a relay race from Paris to Rotterdam? Nothing much, beside the fact that Valk Welding is sponsoring both.

Via the comprehensive school Da Vinci College, Valk Welding is sponsoring a new housing project in Serekunda, Gambia. This new housing project includes two schools, now to be found in some buildings in a very poor state of maintenance. Valk Welding is donating among others scaffold material and tools, with which the project can be (partly) realised.

The Roparun is a household word in the Netherlands. The 14th edition is held in 2005. This year, Valk Welding is sponsoring the AZRR BIOS team, including collaborators of the ambulance service of Rotterdam and nearby municipalities. The sponsored sum is used to pay the teams expenses; the rest of the money goes to the Foundation Roparun which makes donations to projects in the domain of health care.

The next link brings you to Stichting Derde Wereld Hulp (foundation third world help), with a travel report from October 2004.

Gambia
From brick to vocational education
Private help from Dutchmen to Third World increases

In the spring of 2005 and under the killing sun, volunteers of the Da Vinci College  in Dordrecht are building a school for lower vocational education in Gambia, West-Africa. Seventy teachers, pupils and others are working together with local construction workers and an organised group of street children. The people from the Netherlands have taken part of their holidays and paid their transport and accommodation themselves. “I believe in this project,” says electricity expert Ben van der Sanden, after having inspected a meter cabinet. “We are building something very tangible, a school. Together, we are building a better future for the youngest generation.”

The school project in the village of Serekunda is a fine example of a successful private initiative. The people from Dordrecht form part of a group of Dutchmen who are committed to the Third World. They collect spectacle frames, offer free dental care on the spot, and help psychiatric patients in the bush. They also build schools and shelter houses for street children and prostitutes. “This is a trend in our society,” concludes Arnaut Eimers, cluster head of the NCDO (National Committee for International Collaboration and Sustainable Development). With the declining trust the Dutchmen have in authorities and help organisations, private initiative is growing. Actions are often supported by a whole village, school or association. “People are of the opinion that there is too considerable a rake-off. They want to see with their own eyes what is done with their money.” In the Netherlands, there are least ten thousand aid projects in the private domain, according to Eimers.

The initiators come from all levels of the population; surgeons and professors, lorry drivers and women from rural associations. “They all are of the opinion that the world must be made a better place,” the NCDO-head says. Each year, the NCDO subsidises almost six hundred small scale projects. The commission provides counselling to set up the projects and doubles the result of the collections supported. Each year, the independent NCDO spends seven million Euro. The money comes from the Ministry of Development Co-operation.

Most of the subsidised projects can be found in Africa. Kenia scores highest with 42 private initiatives, Ghana follows with 20. The highest density however is found in the West African Gambia, one of the poorest countries in the world. It is estimated that in the Netherlands, one million people have started about hundred aid projects. The NCDO subsidises eleven activities, among which the school project of the Da Vinci College. Together with his colleague Ruud Verkerk, teacher Rob Nederlof works to realise his ideal. “We aim at bringing vocational education here on a higher level,” he says after a day of dragging and organising. “The next step is to make education accessible for large groups of pupils, who are too poor to come to school. In the end, we are thinking of knowledge exchange between teachers and pupils in Dordrecht and Serekunda.”