Manitoba's connection with Tanzania highlighted during International Development Week
Rural development challenges in African countries like Tanzania aren't that different from rural development challenges in Manitoba, says Dinah Ceplis. She works with both the Brandon-based Marquis Project and Tanzania Society of Agricultural Education and Extension (TSAEE).
Ceplis spoke on Thursday at the Sowing Seeds of Development Roundtable Discussion at Canadian Mennonite University. The event was part of the Manitoba Council for International Co-operation's 26th annual International Development Week lineup.
Ceplis, who lives north of Minnedosa, spends her winters working in Tanzania. She has made 15 trips to rural areas near Lake Victoria beyond the city of Mwanza in Tanzania.
"People are living on less than a dollar a day—the types of poverty we can't even imagine here in Canada," Ceplis said.
As 75 per cent of the population in Tanzania depends on agriculture and related industries to make a living, she said, TSAEE's focus is on sustainable micro-enterprise projects that contribute to local economies.
"(The projects) could be as small as making tea and fried donuts and selling them in a little roadside stand," Ceplis said.
A key challenge to getting and keeping the projects going is the migration of young people out of rural areas to urban centres where they think they can find jobs, she said.
While the situation is different in Manitoba, she said youth retention in rural areas is an issue in the province as well.
"Here in rural Manitoba, if you read the Grade 12 grad newspapers, you'll find very few of the graduating students are planning to stay in the rural area. They're all going to head off," Ceplis said.
Both the Marquis Project and TSAEE began to take off in the 1980s. Collaboration between the two initiatives over the years has seen residents from the Brandon area, like Ceplis, travel to Tanzania and vice versa.
Janice Hamilton, executive director of the Manitoba Council for International Co-operation, said a strong connection has developed.
"I think for Manitobans, they can relate. Especially if we think of agriculture," Hamilton said.
"Although the crops may be different, the whole idea of the growing and living in a rural society, that's the commonality."
