IN March I visited several marvelous rural development projects in India. They were a stark contrast to the rural “un-development” that seems to be taking place back home.
I returned to hear about B.C.’s new Forest and Range Practices Act. It concentrates logging rights on crown land in the hands of a few large companies who are no longer required to mill their products close to the area where the trees are cut. Many forestry towns are losing mills and jobs.
In Saskatchewan the government just announced the closure of 31 rural service centres. Hands-on government agrologists are no longer available to directly examine soils and crops. Farmers will have to rely on phone calls to regional specialists for help. With the centres go critical experience and community economic leadership.
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These are a couple of recent moves in a general trend toward the dismantling of community life in rural Western Canada. They follow on the heels of several others.
Social and cultural well-being is plundered as school districts are combined and rural schools closed. Local political control has been lost to municipality mergers. Health care is compromised as health regions consolidate, closing hospitals and long-term care beds. As the institutions leave, so do the doctors, nurses, teachers and counsellors.
In India I saw several communities in which the reverse is taking place. One village south of Kolkata was a cluster of airy, mud-walled homes thatched with rice-straw. For an hour or so, I listened to the story of their struggles with hunger and illness. For decades they had lived with virtually no food three months out of each year. Their children were victims of chronic dysentery and diarrhea. There was a high rate of miscarriage. Women were confined to their homes, lonely and illiterate.
In the last year, however, Lutheran World Service helped to stimulate some enormous strides toward healthy living. They gathered the women and talked about improving their children’s health. As the women discovered each other, a new and delightful experience, they began to tackle village problems.
They formed a grain bank, contributing after the harvests and borrowing when the food ran out. They drilled a well that gave potable water and no longer used dugouts for drinking. They shared ideas about child care and trained midwives.
In 12 months they made amazing and sustainable gains in well-being in spite of entrenched economic and social patterns.
Is there anything we can learn from them? At least a couple of things. First, it’s not too late for our rural communities. We’re not yet at the place where these Indian communities started.
Secondly, perhaps we need to look outside government to some of our non-government organizations for help. Perhaps together we could catalyze some rural redevelopment.
Cam Harder is associate professor of systematic theology at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Saskatoon. The opinions expressed in this column are not necessarily those of The Western Producer.
