The community of suku Hoholau built a small bridge with their first infrastructure grant from the PNDS program, helping farmers sell locally grown coffee at a nearby market.
“This bridge is important as it facilitates the transportation of local produce from the community to the market” said Domingos da Silva, president of Accountability Planning Committee (Tetun acronym KPA).
“The bridge is also important as it facilitates children to go to school during the rainy season. Normally there is heavy water flow in the river”.
Suku Hoholau’s new coffee bridge
The new bridge will help the communities of Saharai and Manubata aldeia, who produce a lot of local produce, such as coffee, cassava, sweet potatoes, taro, fruits and vegetables.
Before the bridge was built, the community worked together to make a basic bridge out of pine trees so they could cross the river, they called it the ‘Pine Tree Bridge’. However, after the new bridge was built to help transport produce, the community changed the name to ‘Coffee Bridge’.
The community also built a multi-purpose community centre in the village. The community plan to use the center for community meetings to discuss government programs and as a place for the implementation of integrated community health services, SISCa. It will also be used by the Agriculture Extension workers to share agricultural information.
Community centre, in suku Hoholau, Aileu
The total annual grant from PNDS for this village was US$45,000.00. The fund was divided into two categories: operational fund of $5,500.00, and infrastructure fund of $39,500.00. The infrastructure fund was further divided between the bridge ($22,168.68) and the multi-purpose community centre (US$17,313.32).
Hoholau village is part of Aileu-Vila Sub-district, Aileu Distritu. This village implemented PNDS program during the pilot phase. The village has 5 aldeia Aslimhati, Hatulai, Manubata, Mau-Uluria and Saharai. The village has 360 households, with a total population of more than 1600 people who will benefit from the two projects.
