Women Making a Difference met on Saturday 16 September 2015 to hear a report on Susan and Derrie's recent visit to Malawi.

Derrie was very touched by the women she had meet during her 9 days in Malawi.  She said that meeting the women that Chifundo and Chanasa are helping and realising that they are at the bottom on the socio-economic scale gave a much better understanding of the importance of the work.  

Susan and Derrie met with the women in the three different groups as well as the tailors, Annette, Susan and Constance, and Susan ran workshops to show the women how to make the SOKO Fund bags. The Chansa AGM also took place and each group were presented with a new Steam Iron.  At the AGM the groups brought the items they had recently made and these were inspected for quality.  The importance of consistent quality of the goods being made is an area that the trustees are working on with the groups.  Derrie and Susan also attended the URC Synod convention where women were being taught how to graft trees.  It may be possible in the future to make links through the Synod with a more rural area to increase the number of groups.

Derrie visited a health clinic in Goa which, although quite large, only has one trained member of staff.  Two houses have been built there to hopefully attract some more trained medical staff. Mothers and babies there where given 'fish and chip' tops and hats. Susan visited the SOKO Fund girls and the Harry Potter scholars.

Derrie was a great help doing all the driving.  The trustees had a capacity building weekend which was a great help in getting to know each other better and moving forward.  On the Friday evening they shared a meal together.  On the Saturday morning time was spent creating an action plan for the future and in the afternoon a business meeting was held with Alice.  The Sunday was church in the morning and the AGM in the afternoon.  Plans were made to improve the quality of goods produced.  Firstly Alice and the group leader will inspect each item, returning any for improvement, then Maria will inspect them before they are sent out.  The SOKO Fund order is for 50 bags.  The Soche East group is making 7, the tailors 5 each and the other two groups 14 each.  Each group is arranging how best to make them amongst themselves but is is being stressed that completing them on time and to the correct standard is vital.

Overall it was a positive visit.

The events for the rest of 2015 were shared and the need to try to find more women either interested in sewing or supporting Women Making a Difference was discussed.  A delicious lunch was then shared.