Madagascar
75% of the population of Madagascar lives on less than $1.90 per day and upwards of 80% of children under 18 experience the effects of extreme poverty, which include chronic malnutrition.
Idilana Community Preschool Construction
in partnership with:
The Project: consisted of the construction of a rural, community preschool that will benefit approximately 30 of the community’s youngest children.
Location: Idilana, District d’Antananarivo Avaradrano, Madagascar
Idilana village is located in the northeast of the capital Antananarivo, thirty kilometers from the city. The area is rural and remote, without electricity, limited access to medical care and only a single dirt access road. Houses scattered on the hills above rice fields. There are 600 people leaving there, approximatively 150 households. 90% of the villagers are peasants but also craftsmen, earning less than $2 a day.
Our donation of $3,750 was used to build a preschool that will enable several local women to work to feed their families while their young children receive quality care. The local government will be granting funding for two people from the community to work in the preschool and the community itself invested their time and energy as an in-kind contribution to help build the preschool.
The idea to build a community preschool emerged from the demands of the villagers themselves, and more precisely the demand of the women/ mothers, who need to work in the fields, and in the same time take care of their children.
The preschool is estimated to accommodate around 20 children per school year. The first school year started in September 2021 with 22 children, shortly after the construction was completed. The preschool will be equipped with solar panels, in order to allow children to benefit from educational activities requiring audiovisual material.
In addition to Luena Foundation’s donation for the preschool, a large French corporation has donated several solar panels which will provide electricity for the village. Solar electricity will help to improve health, education, and economic opportunities for the families.
Our Local Partner Organization
Mazava Vent et Soleil de Madagascar is a non-profit organization registered in Strasbourg, France, and also a Malagasy NGO registered in the ministry of internal affairs in Madagascar. Mazava works hand in hand with impoverished communities living in Madagascar to bring about sustainable change. It aims to provide fair conditions for the families in rural areas of the country to ensure they can raise the children in dignity, and help them preserve the environment.
One way to achieve this goal is to provide solar electricity to improve health, education, and economic opportunities for the families (in Madagascar 90% of the people in rural areas don’t have electricity; no light for health centers, nor for schools, and no possibility to use electrical equipment for work).
Current projects in the village of Idilana:
– Construction of a preschool (funded by Luena Foundation grant)
– Reforestation projects
– Providing bicycles for pupils ( the secondary school is one hour and a half walking, no public transportation)
– Create an educational garden in permaculture, in order to sensitize families to agroecological techniques, and increase their income
– Electrification of the preschool and the primary school
– Electrification of the health center
– Construction and electrification of a workshop with multiple and much needed activities such as carpentry, welding, sewing etc
Beginning in 2022, Mazava Vent et Soleil de Madagascar plans to set up in a second village with the same partnership approach between the association and the villagers.
MADAGASCAR up close
Population: 27.69 million
Region: Island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately 400 kilometres off the coast of East Africa
Area: 587,041 km²
