Nutricom Cheers Up Patients, Promise To Fix Some Challenges At Area 18 Health Centre

Official from Nutricom giving gifts to a woman

on the floor are some Items donated to the patients 

A local company, Nutricom, brought laughter on New Year’s Eve to patients and guardians at Area 18 Health Centre in Lilongwe, when the company paid a visit to shared with them various food items including their famous product, Kombucha juice.

Peter Ndalama, Director for Nutricom while cheering up the patients made a promise to the hospital management that the company is coming back make a donation of bedsheets and help to sort out some other challenges facing the health centre.

Masiyano in white gown and to his left is Ndalama

Ndalama and Masiyano giving gifts to patient 

Ndalama said as the year of 2015 comes to an end enters 2016, Nutricom felt the importance of cheer-up the sick at Area 18 Health Centre which is closer to the company’s operational area.

The company presented to each patient some New Year’s Eve gifts which included various food items and some toiletries. 

For these gifts, Ndalama said “We also knew that the clinic has admitted some patients who may not be able to access to some basic items during this festive season.” He then added that this was also part of showing appreciation to the society for the good business happened in just ended year of 2015.

Apart from reaching out to patients, Nutricom has also committed itself to fix some challenges facing the Health Centre.

“When we entered the hospital wards, we noted that the Health Centre has inadequate bed sheets. So we are definitely coming back soon to donate the bed sheets. 

We also learnt that their water reservoir is not functioning, so on Monday (on 3rd January 2016) we are sending our Plumber to fix the problem.” Assures Ndalama

Masiyano

Meanwhile, the Chief Clinical Officer for the Health Centre, Kedson Masiyano has expressed the hospital’s sincere appreciation for the gesture and asked other companies to borrow leaf from Nutricom.

Masiyano explaning more about the hospital to
Nutricom officials

“We are very excited and it has been a double celebration for us. We are just coming out of Christmas and we are entering a new year, so with their coming they have assisted us with food items for patients. As you may know, Area 18 Health Centre does not have a kitchen. Patients that we keep they bring their own food from home but some of them do have some challenges to access the food.” Said Masiyano

He further highlighted that the food items that have been given to patients was complimenting to the hospital’s advice that patients must always take nutritious food.

Speaking on the promised support from the company, the Chief Clinical Officer said Nutricom assistance “is a positive move in the right direction” 

Masiyano pointed out that at the moment the health centre does not have enough bedclothes and for this reason most patients bring beddings from home.

On the problem of water reservoir he said; “Sometimes we do face problems with intermittent water supply from the Water Board and yet we do have a reservoir which is not functioning for some time.”

ETG Sales Clerks In Custody For Overcharging Subsidised Fertiliser

Two female sales clerk for Export Trading Group (ETG) in Mwanza district have been arrested for allegedly overpricing fertiliser under Government 'Farm Input Subsidy Programme (FISP)' meant for smallholder farmers.

Under FISP, smallholder farmers are buying each bag of fertilizer at K3, 500. However the two officers asking farmers to pay an extra K1,500 per bag of the commodity.

Two employees Thokozani Chitaonga aged 18 and Martha Jali aged 32 working at Mchotseni ETG Depot were caught red handed after a victim customer reported them to police.

Confirming on the development, Mwanza district Police Public Relations Officer, Inspector Edwin Kaunda, said as the two were on duty on Tuesday selling fertiliser they told a customer wanting to buy two bags of fertilizer to pay more than normal price.

Inspector Kaunda said when the customer identified as Richard Mikeasi was about to pay for his two bags of fertilizer the two female sales clerks asked him to pay K10 thousand instead of K7 thousand.

"The customer was surprised to hear these women asking him to pay extra K3 thousand to get two bags of fertiliser. But he accepted to pay as told and he later tipped police about his encounter at the shop." Explains Kaunda

"When we got the information we did not hesitate to effect an arrest of these two women" said Kaunda

The suspects Thokozani Chitaonga aged 18 hails from Malili village in the area of Traditional Authority Malili in Lilongwe while her accomplice Martha Jali aged 32 hails from Mapila village in the area of Traditional Authority Njolomole in Ntcheu district.

The Police officer said the two will get charges of Official Corruption and are expected to appear in court soon.

Controversy Over Morgan Heritage Performance Using Instrumental Tracks at Lilongwe Show

Gramps, Peetah and Mojo performance at
Silver Stadium 

Sunday night performance by the famous reggae band, Morgan Heritage gets divided views in Malawi following their one and half hour live performance using laptop to play their instrumetal music tracks.

Morgan Heritage ‘CTBC’ International For Growth Of Young African Talents

Young Africans aspiring to become music stars will very soon have a big platform to grow their talent and get exposure to the whole world as the Jamaica’s music group, Morgan Heritage promise to bring their Cool To Be Conscious (CTBC) Music company to the continent of Africa.

Morgan Heritage Promise “Great” Show And Another Festival In 2016

From left to right: Gramps, Peetah, Mojo
and Born Afrika (pic by Fatsani Menyani)

Nervousness and waiting for the World’s famous Reggae music group, Morgan Heritage to come to Malawi is finally over, as three band members arrives in the country. This puts to an end all worries and possibility of having the show cancelled following postponement of their Zimbabwe and Senegal shows.

We Need Adequate, Sustainable Financing Of Health Sector- Trapence

Trapence in red scarf: pictured in November 2015
briefing media after presentimg petition to
National Assembly calling for adequate and
Sustainable financing of health sector 

Rights Activists continue to call for adequate and suitable financing of the Malawi’s Health Sector.

Gift Trapence, Executive Director for Cedep and Chairperson for Citizens Forum for the Defense of Good Governance said in an interview that the country needs to end persistently health sector challenges by making sure that the sector is adequately allocated with funding from the national budget and implement other sustainable ways of financing the sector including suggested user fees in hospitals.

The calls are coming at the moment the country is continuously facing challenges in the Health Sector which includes shortage of drugs, inadequate nurses and doctors, stoppage of Locum services among others.

“What we are asking the Government is to make sure that they are able to support or finance the Health System, at least 15% of the National total budget should be allocated to Ministry of Health or to the Health Sector." He said

Trapence

"This is in line with the Government Commitment what we call Abuja Declarations. African nations signed this declaration so that they are able to finance the health sector with enough resources with enough human resource. So we would want to see a shift in the way how we prioritize our spending we want more spending to the health sector. 

But as well, to have a long lasting solution in terms of sustainable financing of the health sector. Because what we have seen, there is a lot of ad hoc in the way how we finance the ministry of health and yet this is a most critical sector that we need to fund. Because healthy people means healthy nation and also it means development.” Explained Trapence 

He said Malawi has little resources but if used better some challenges can be fixed and emphasised prioritizing the spending because they can contribute meaningfully in averting challenges being faced.

On Friday, 20th November this year, concerned citizens comprising of Civil Society Organizations, Health Professional Associations and Patient Interest Groups delivered petition to the National Assembly calling for immediate response to the persistently inadequate national budget allocation to the health sector.

The petition highlighted number of challenges the country is facing due to inadequate funding of the sector.

It raised concern that Malawi remains one of the countries failing to meet the World Health organization (WHO) standard of 23 doctors/10,000 population necessary to deliver essential health services.  However, currently Malawi has 2 doctors and 37 midwives for every 100,000 people. And that the situation does not spare the paramedics and pharmacists.

The petition also revealed that due to inadequate funding most hospitals have stopped Locum Services.

They also asked government to speed up the consultation processes on health financing including user fees as an option to sustainably finance the health sector.

“It is healthy people who will fully contribute to the development of this nation. Therefore investing in health is one sure way of accelerating the sustainable development of the nation of Malawi. This is why the need to obtain 15% national budget allocation, including a clear strategy to strengthen the health systems can never be overemphasized. However the Government needs to realize that achievement of the Essential Health Package requires continued adequate financing.” Read the petition 

Mw Govt Calls NGO’s To Utilize Green Climate Fund Opportunity

Msaka 

Malawi Government has expressed its desire to see more institutions developing project proposals to Green Climate Fund to enable the country’s implementation of its climate change management priorities.

At the moment, the Green Climate Fund Board approved a six year project for Malawi worth US$ 12.3 million to enhance early warning systems as part of disaster risk reduction.

Minister of Natural Resources, Energy and Mining, Bright Msaka said Green Climate Fund provides climate finance for developing countries to undertake actions to address climate change through mitigation, adaptation, capacity building among others.

But for the country to ably implement its climate change management priorities, Msaka said stakeholders from Government institutions, private sector, Civil Society, faith based institutions and academia are encouraged to develop project proposals which takes into account the country’s-driven strategies, priorities and needs, and submit proposals to the fund. 

He expressed hope that successful proposals will help to attract investment to the country’s instruments such as National Climate Change Investment Plan, Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions and National Adaptation Programmes of Action.

“There is need therefore to initiate development project proposals to be submitted to the Green Climate Fund and other funds that are available under the Convention so that Malawi can develop and implement projects to restore its rivers, degraded ecosystems, forests, reduce emissions, increase climate resilience with the objective of achieving both mitigation and adaptation goals.” Said Msaka

The developed nations agreed to put money in a fund and money from that a fund will be distributed and allocated to countries depending upon the projects that a countries propose.

The minister said “There are identified areas where Government and NGO's can propose to the fund in order for them to get funding. So yes there is going to be available money to Malawi if we submit projects that meet the criteria that has been set for that purpose.”

He among others noted that the climate funding will assist the country in areas of climate information for farmers for example on time when the rains comes.

"We are going to have information readily available and we will going to work with institutions including NASFAM and others including extension workers to ensure that the information is readily available to farmers. The fact that we are going to also being in a position to tell people about and measure the levels of rivers and leaks and all water bodies we can then warn people to move away from areas of dangers so already issues of adaptation are being implemented through that fund" said Msaka 

He emphasized that in terms of Technology and transfer, Malawi stands to benefit in technology identification, development and transfer of environmentally-sound technologies. Such technologies will be harnessed and developed through the support from the Technology Framework Mechanism which will assist Malawi in addressing its cleaner technology priorities.

He said Forestry sector will benefit from the Global Landscapes Forum: Africa Restoration Initiative also referred to as AFR100 which is continental initiative with the goal of bringing 100 million hectares of degraded and deforested land in Africa into restoration by the year 2030.

Paris Agreement calls for a signature ceremony in April 2016 and requests that UN Secretary General should keep the Agreement open for signing until April 2017.  Malawi Government will after due consultations be signing the Paris Agreement thereafter ratifying it once necessary consultations and all arrangements are finalized.

Paris Agreement

The purpose of Paris Agreement will enhance the implementation of the Climate Change Convention that was adopted in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June 1992. It also aims at strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.

The agreement will contribute to holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2º Celsius and pursue to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 Celcius

Paris Agreement acknowledges the inclusion of actions that contribute to Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) by avoiding deforestation and also recognizes role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks.

The Paris Agreement contains decisions that will allow mobilization and provision of climate finance for developing countries to undertake actions to address climate change through mitigation, adaptation, capacity building, technology development and transfer, REDD+ and loss and damage.

The provision of scaled up financial resources should aim to achieve a balance between adaptation and mitigation, taking into account country-driven strategies, the priorities and needs of developing country Parties, especially those that are vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change.

Therefore developed countries are expected to continue to mobilize US$100 billion annually taking into account needs and priorities of developing countries.

The Agreement recognizes that climate finance will come from both external and national resources and also recognizes that grant-based resources are the preferred resource for adaptation actions as opposed to loans.

The agreement has established a Committee on Capacity building, whose aim is to address capacity gaps and needs in implementing climate change actions.

It is believed that unlike Climate Change Convention and its Kyoto Protocol, Paris Agreement has a clear pathway and road map for sources and channels for provision of climate finance