There was a time when just seeing Soche Hill would make Edda Libwalo, 73, glow with happiness.

Those were the days when the famous landmark of Blantyre District had lush vegetation. Then, trees were in abundance, as were wild fruits.

“When I was young, we used to go to Soche Hill to gather wild fruits and other edibles. The hill was a source of our livelihood. I long for my girlhood days,” she says.

She laments that what was once a wonder to behold and their source of livelihood is now an eyesore, devoid of trees. 

“The hill has been robbed of its beauty and I am bitter. I no longer take delight in the hill,” says Libwalo of Traditional Authority (TA) Somba in Blantyre.

Her anger over the depletion of trees around Soche Hill prompted her to be involved in a programme that aims to address her concerns.

The Climate Smart Enhanced Public Works Programme (EPWP) has given Libwalo a glimmer of hope that Soche Hill will be restored to its former glory.

The National Local Government Finance Committee (NLGFC) is facilitating the implementation of the eight-month EPWP on a pilot basis, and rolled out in September 2020.

NLGFC is a constitutional body established to mobilize, distribute and ensure efficient utilization of financial resources among local authorities for effective and efficient service delivery and development in Malawi.

The K310 million-EPWP is being implemented in Chitipa, Karonga, Nkhotakota, Kasungu, Dowa, Lilongwe, Balaka, Chiradzulu, Phalombe and Blantyre districts.

EPWP aims to address the challenges faced during the implementation of the World Bank-financed Malawi Social Action Fund (MASAF) 1V Productive Public Works Programme.

The challenges included low compliance with technical norms and standards, creation of large catchments that were difficult to manage, inadequate financial support to extension workers for their operations, and limited monitoring and supervision by local authorities.

The challenges resulted in the creation of low-quality community assets, and lack of ownership to sustain such assets.

The programme attempts to address the challenges in preparation for the implementation of future PWP interventions in Malawi.

In the case of Blantyre, the district has five EPWP catchments, one of which is Kajombo covering Group Village Headmen Jumbe and Somba.

The catchment, which is in the area of TA Somba, comprises eight villages including Somba 1 where Libwalo comes from.

Agriculture is the main activity in the catchment where households grow different types of crops during rainfall season.

During irrigation season, the catchment grows tomatoes, onions, leaf vegetables and green maize. 

But sadly, the Kajombo catchment which falls within the Soche Hill watershed has in recent years suffered from severe environmental degradation.

The degradation of the hill has had a negative effect on the locals’ lives who are now struggling to live due to a reduction in their crop yields.    

“Soche Hill is an asset not only to people in the catchment but also to the watershed,” says Thokozani Mwape, the Agriculture Extension Development Coordinator (AEDO) for the area. 

The watershed encompasses Limbe, Misesa, Quarry, Manja and other populated surrounding areas.

“It is a source of firewood, poles and water for domestic use. It is also a habitat for a range of game,” Mwape told this writer in an interview in Somba 1 Village.

He says Soche Hill has been deforested because of encroachment, quarry mining, careless cutting of trees and the starting of bush fires.

These illegal human activities, according to Mwape, have resulted in devastating soil and water loss, creation of more gullies and reduction of farm land.

He says: “This has made most households to be food-insecure.”  

Mwape says because of illegal human activities around Soche Hill, some rivers and streams dried up, reducing access to water for domestic use.

The EPWP’s focus is therefore on Integrated Watershed Management (IWM) covering sub-projects such as land resource conservation, afforestation, environment and road infrastructure, and sustainable livelihoods. 

EPWP, which has been designed to strengthen household resilience to shocks and create community assets, targets ultra-poor households.

Most of the households in Kajombo catchment are poor and not surprisingly, they have embraced the EPWP, seeing it as a chance to right their wrongs.

During a community participatory rural appraisal exercise, land degradation due to soil erosion was identified as the number problem in the catchment.

Locals have initiated several projects aimed not only at restoring Soche Hill to its former beauty, but also improving soil fertility within the catchment.

The interventions include planting trees around Soche Hill and along river banks to stop land from being degraded further.

Communities are also making water and soil conservation structures such as swales and marker ridges, and check dams to prevent soil erosion.

They EPWP has also given them an opportunity to embarked on income generating activities such as fish farming to improve their well-being.

The EPWP targets 1,000 participants per district and a maximum of five micro-catchments in each district, not larger than 250 hectares each. 

Libwalo is one of the 200 beneficiaries who are implementing the micro projects in the Kajombo catchment.

She says she decided to participate in the programme despite her advanced age for one reason:  to restore Soche Hill.

“It was a beautiful sight in the Ngwazi’s time,” Libwalo says, vividly full of nostalgia for the days of Malawi’s first President, Hastings Kamuzu Banda.

Libwalo, who has 15 grandchildren children, blames the introduction of multiparty politics in the country in the early 1990s for the destruction of Soche Hill.  

“It began with corrupt forest guards who let in people to cut trees after being bribed. Before long, it became a free-for-all,” she says.

Although Libwala is paid for the work she does, she says her motive is a genuine desire to stop further destruction of the environment in the area.

Beneficiaries of the EPWP which ends in March 2021, get wages that are intended to assist in stimulation of local markets as people spend their money to buy their daily needs.

“I want to see a change before I follow my ancestors,” Libwala told this writer as she busied herself tending tree seedlings in a nursery in her village.  

About 10,000 trees are to be planted around Soche Hill. More than half have been planted.  

Maria Supuni, 37, one of the Kajombo catchment supervisors, or foremen as they are known, concurs with Libwala.

“Once upon a time, this place was forested. The soil was fertile and we often had good crop harvests,” she says.

“Today, the forests are gone, and so, too, the rich soil. As a consequence, we frequently have floods and dry spells, resulting in poor crop yields.”

 Supuni says unless people stop doing things that harm the environment, “hunger will continually knock on our doors.”   

Mwape says the EPWP has helped a lot to change people’s attitude towards the environment through training and their own experience.

“They have realized the importance of re-afforestation, and having soil and water conservation structures,” he says.

Mwape says people are so keen to preserve the environment that they have bye-laws that are being enforced through local leaders and community policing.    

“Such zeal will sustain the programme as communities own it and take full responsibility for addressing environmental issues,” he says.

Story Credits: Gospel Mwalwanda (Contributor)