Scotland can offer hope for a Miracle

MIRACLE never stood a chance: the five-year-old lost his mother the day after he was born and his father a week later.

Yet, today, he is thriving thanks to the generosity of the community around him. He was taken in by an uncle and is being supported through school by a local organisation, Paradiso.

The group was set up by HIV positive women for counselling sessions and soon developed into an orphan network when members started dying. Some 264 orphans are registered with the organisation, but it can afford to support only 95.

Paradiso, supported indirectly by Oxfam, is based at a community centre by a quarry in rural Lilongwe, where women and children break stones for a few pence a day. Visitors are greeted by members - most of whom are HIV positive - dancing and singing traditional songs.

When Jack McConnell, the then first minister, arrived in Malawi two years ago, following in the footsteps of David Livingstone, he experienced a similar welcome.

But two years later, has anything been achieved?

Malawi is certainly on the map - though this might have more to do with the pop star Madonna adopting a child from the small African country than the patronage of Mr McConnell. However, he can take credit for encouraging serious donors to come to Malawi, including the Clinton Hunter Foundation and Sir Tom Farmer.

Mr McConnell was also responsible for committing a significant amount of taxpayers' money to Malawi. Since the co-operation agreement was signed in November 2005, £6.6 million has been spent on projects in the country. About £320,000 is also spent every year running the international development arm of the Scottish Government.

However, there remain concerns about exactly where Scottish taxpayers' money is going. Helen Magombo, an advocacy worker with Oxfam in Lilongwe, is concerned that the Government is spending too much money on flying over academics to share their expertise and not enough on absolute need in a country where 133 children out of every 1,000 die before the age of five.

In the latest round of funding for Malawi, ten out of 18 allocations went towards health. However, only two of these projects are offering direct assistance to communities. The rest are training healthcare professionals in Malawi, often by flying out Scottish healthcare workers at considerable cost.

Ms Magombo wants the next round of funding to give more direct support for health and education. "We have a very big crisis around health in Malawi," she said. "It is such a major priority in the context of HIV/AIDS. We have a lot of people who need access to basic healthcare, like a nurse or centre nearby, so those are the priority areas."

Ms Magombo also said experts in Malawi should decide on where the need is. "There is too much involvement from Scottish Executive officials trying to tell you how to spend the money," she said.

She also called on the administration to lift conditions attached to aid that say any applicant to the international fund must have a connection to Scotland.

There are concerns from a cultural perspective also. The Scottish Goverenment is committed to a number of projects across civil governance, the economy, health and education. Marc Jessel, the director of the British Council in Malawi, said the programme needed more focus.

"I don't think Scotland can be considered a big player in terms of development in Malawi, but I think it could leave a much bigger mark if it really makes itself a bridge builder because people are very interested in Scotland and vice versa," he said.

"But I think there is a little bit of confusion from where I stand in terms of the objectives the Government is trying to achieve. It gets involved in very, very good projects, but its impact gets diluted because the big-step plan is not clear."

Aid is a massive part of the Malawian economy. Almost half of the government's budget is from donors and just driving around Lilongwe one cannot help but notice the huge buildings and Jeeps owned by non-governmental organisations such as the United Nations, World Food Programme and USAID.

In serious diplomatic circles, which Mr McConnell will soon be joining in his new role as British High Commissioner of Malawi, Scotland is seen as something of a bit-player. However, that does not mean it cannot play its part. Michael Keating, country director for the UN, said that as long as Scotland is careful not to "spread itself too thinly" or duplicate the work of other aid organisations, there is no reason why it cannot be a significant force in Malawi.

"Some big players have the money, but they do not necessarily have the people to come here and spend time on the ground and do monitoring and on the job capacity development. I get the impression there are a lot of Scots here and sometimes having people here is as important as having the money."

The new Scottish administration has pledged at least £3 million a year for Malawi out of an annual £9 million international aid budget.

Linda Fabiani, the minister for international development, dismissed the idea of dropping the Scottish connection. However, she did say that the international development fund needs to be more efficient. "Whatever we do has to be measurable in terms of what is Scotland achieving," she said. "So it has to be focused and has to be sustainable because what we are really doing is working towards the day when we do not need to give help at all.

"I would never for a minute suggest £9 million is a lot or we can turn a country around alone, but if we can do even a little good, it is worth it. We should never say that is not enough."

HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT, LOW INCOME AND AN ECOMOMY DWARFED BY FALKIRK

• Malawi is one of the ten poorest countries in the world.

• The link with Scotland began with David Livingstone's journey to Malawi in 1859. Christian missions from Scotland followed and the Presbyterian church remains a major force in the country to this day.

• The population trebled under Hastings Banda - the dictator of three decades who outlawed contraception - and is now around 12 million.

• More than half the population is less than 15-years-old.

• The majority of people live in rural areas, mainly on subsistence farms.

• More than half live below the poverty line on less than 50p a day.

• The average income is £80 a year, around 170 times less than the average Scots income.

• Unemployment is 90 per cent and there is no access to clean and safe water for 40 per cent of people.

• The diet of 22 per cent of people does not meet their nutritional requirements.

• Although Malawi's population is more than twice the size of Scotland's and its land area is around 50 per cent larger, its economy is only a little over 1 per cent of Scotland. Falkirk's economy alone is twice the size of Malawi's.

• Macro-economic stability and good maize harvests have resulted in economic growth in excess of 8 per cent in 2006. It is forecast growth will average 6 per cent in 2007.

• Current political instability is being caused by the parliament's inability to approve the budget over a political argument.

• Average life expectancy is 37 years compared with 79 in the UK. It has fallen significantly in the past 20 years.

• Out of every 1,000 children, 133 die before their fifth birthday.

• Children under the age of five are 27 times more likely to die than in Scotland.

• Malawi's government can only afford to spend on average around £6 per person each year on healthcare compared with more than £2,000 in Scotland.

• Officially, the maternal mortality rate is 984 deaths per 100,000 live births, but the World Health Organisation has said it could be as high as 1,800 deaths per 100,000. Only Afghanistan and Sierra Leone - where there is ongoing conflict - have a worse rate of maternal mortality.

• With half the population not living within 5km of a clinic, traditional healers take on much of healthcare.

• About 14 per cent of the adult population is infected with HIV/AIDS and a million children have been orphaned by the disease. A further 84,000 are orphaned every year.

• More than 350,000 orphans and vulnerable children receive material support from government and other organisations.

• The number of people tested for HIV has tripled from about 150,000 in 2002 to 440,000 in 2005. The number started on antiretroviral treatment has increased from 4,000 in 2003 to 100,000 in June 2007.

• However, new infections are estimated at 90,000 per year and there is a shortage of nurses.

• By December 2005 there were 239 approved HIV testing and counselling sites, compared with 11 in 2004. By May 2006, 119 sites were offering Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission out of a potential 617 sites.

• There is one qualified teacher for every 95 pupils, compared with one for every 14.9 pupils in Scotland.