In the Northernmost region of India and between the mountain ranges of the Himalayas and Karakoram sits the Ladakh region, one of the highest inhabitated deserts anywhere in the world. While this high altitude arid environment can be incredibly harsh, local communities subsist on agriculture. Recent production has been severely impacted by rapidly shrinking glaciers, highlighting how even the most remote communities are far from isolated. In addition, territorial conflict in this contested region continues to disrupt village life.
Health, Environment and Literacy in the Himalayas (HEALTH) INC was founded to help improve the quality of life of the vibrant communities and culture that lives on in these difficult conditions through capacity building initatives. The program strives to serve the people most impacted by conflict, climate change and environmental degradation and where they lack basic social services (functional schools and health services). As our programs stress building skills and linkages over building things, we create sustainability (not dependency) in these forgotten villages.
This incredible organization currently has a number of ongoing projects that are supported by the Foundation!
Funding for these projects is also being raised by Celine Souland, who is on a cycling journey across the Himalayas. Be sure to check out her blog to learn more about her trip and how you can contribute to this great cause! http://freewheelinghimalaya.blogspot.com/p/mary-tidlund-charitable-foundation.html
Ongoing Health Inc Projects
Women and children's development program
An integrated program designed by 11 women's co-operatives in some of the remotest villages in Ladakh. Their goals are to address global climate changes affecting their agricultural self-sufficiency, as well as nutritional/developmental deficiencies in 0-14 year-olds in their villages.
The women work on new crops and technologies (greenhouses, solar-electric fencing), construct solar-heated centers in their villages and establish a life-skills education and nutrition program for all based out of those centers.
They have united as one group to enhance income from their micro-enterprises, giving them their own money to develop future programs for themselves.
Future leaders program
Young Ladakhis from the remotest and most disadvantaged villages in Ladakh, who have been forced to end their own schooling to take responsibility for their extended families, join our team for 3 years. During this time they work with us on all our projects, gaining practical skills in community development.
We also support them in completing their education and place them in special training programs across India, where they acquire specialized skills needed here in Ladakh (from physiotherapy training to desktop/book publishing).
At the end of their internship, the young people are placed in the government system, where they can support change from within.
Life skills education
HEALTH Inc is continuing this 7-year program as the only NGO in the region providing universal access to information and literacy in all the 3 languages of Ladakh.
Whether a picture book set for illiterate farmers who are growing vegetables at altitudes over 4,000 meters (over 13,000 feet), an adolescent health game discussing high-risk behaviors, or a children's comic book about disabled kids, materials reach an audience of over 125,000 in Ladakh, and tens of thousands of others through partnerships across northern India.
In May 2008 Roger Vernon, cinematographer, and I traveled to Ladakh India to visit our programs with Health Inc managed by Cynthia Hunt in Leh. We filmed our meetings and travels in the beautiful villages at altitudes of 7,000 feet to 15,000 feet.
Many of the beautiful children, we visited in the schools, had stunted growth from the high altitudes, cold climate and lack of vegetables and fruit.
We first visited Phey which was a mix of private and government school and met with with the fifty-three students and teachers. The students, parents and the community had built a greenhouse on the grounds of the school that was maintained by the children watering the plants daily. The students grew tomatoes, spinach, onion and cilantro.
The structure, if the greenhouses were made with wood frames, had a hill for the back wall that was painted black and a polyethylene sheet of plastic for a cover with windows that closed for aeration. The children ate the produce in their lunch meal of rice/dal and the hopes were to sell bedding plants as a source of income.
We also visited the Landon school with its greenhouse.
We set off in a bus ride to Tar. We trekked up a canyon into Tar and was met by the wonderful village women and hosted by them. This village had built a small school, greenhouse growing lettuce, spinach, mint and cilantro with experimental field and a women's center equipped with solar panels. The beautiful terracing of the grain fields and irrigations have all been hand dug.
The apricots that were given to us as a gift were a real treat.
We also traveled and trekked to Donkhar, Chanchak, Kurambic; visited the communities with greenhouses, sat in on a conflict resolution meeting for the hockey meeting, met with women's groups who made woolen products from looms, saw a solar fenced field of grain and more greenhouses that have all been made with the same durable design as above. Many of the students have their own 12inch by 12inch plots of soil that they have small gardens growing in with sheets of plastic over them.
John Webster donated many of the quality seeds that are used in the greenhouses.
Please view the video of our trip made by volunteers Roger Vernon and Julia Lynx.
Windows Media Video link: http://www.tidlundfoundation.com/video/MTCORE.wmv
HEALTH Inc. (Health, Environment and Literacy in the Himalaya) works in the remote Ladakh region of India. High in the Himalaya, Cynthia Hunt works with local people teaching agriculture, literacy and health. A team led by Cynthia makes books and educational materials targeted specifically at this population. With topics like how to build a green house and grow vegetables year round, a locally adapted nutrition “mountain”, and children’s stories discussing themes such as inclusion of people with disabilities, this program has widespread effect in the community. The Tildund Foundation supports HEALTH Inc. in its efforts to build green houses and fencing for agricultural purposes, and with their educational materials.
In the spring of 2008 Mary Tidlund visited HEALTH Inc. Programs for the first time. Below is her report from the field.
In Ladakh India with Health Inc. we met with founder and director Cynthia Hunt and traveled to programs in remote villages with her and Tsering Stanba director and Dorje, who work with Health Inc. The areas we visited and trekked to, in many cases were schools at Phey, Landon, Tar, Chanchak, Kurimbik, Dogma Burma, Domkhar Gongma, Berma and Dho.
We visited many schools where green houses had been built by a volunteer group of dedicated community members that have been established by Health Inc.'s work. Many of the green houses had been constructed with the back wall as rock or part of a hill and the interior wall painted black to create more heat. Windows on the top and either end provided ventilation for the green house during the day when the heat is the strongest. In the summer the polyethelene plastic top could be rolled back for direct sunlight. The green houses on average were 12 feet by 32 feet made with local materials, wooden frame and some metal piping, polyproethene, rock and soil.
Many of the students at the school were responsible for watering the plants grown, corriander, lettuce, tomato, spinach and onion. In many schools plots of one foot by one foot were grown outside for each student to grow and learn the nutritional value of the plants which are taught to the children and women in bilingual books that Cynthia has written and published. In some cases the produce grown in the green houses was added to the lunch program at the schools. In the high altitude areas (14,000 feet) where the children are suffering from stunted growth and malnutrition the green vegetables are so important for a balanced diet.
In the spring bedding out plants are sold to create income.
In some areas experimental farms are created to grow different crops of potatoes, grains and root vegetables. These farms have hand-dug irrigation canal systems and are tied into a local stream or river. The planting of seeds and harvesting is all done by manual labour and sometimes with the use of a cow. The fields are terraced on the steep mountain sides of the Himalayas.
We met with groups of women in many villages that have been organized by Health Inc. to build and operate green houses, women’s centers that make and sell crafts and child development centers for disabled children.
Health Inc has written and published 150 educational bilingual books and manuals for building green houses, nutrition, health, with local characters to teach the local children and adults.
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| Cover of children's book |