Bridging the Health & Education development gap for Kerau

Kerau community is a “centre” that serves the people of the hamlets perched high on mountain tops, scattered across the beautiful Owen Stanley Ranges in the Goilala District. Goilala District is in the Northern inland area of Central Province, bordering both Morobe and Oro Provinces and covers the mountains and valleys of the Owen Stanely Ranges. Kerau is extremely remote, without direct roads, accessible only by helicopter or on foot. Digicel PNG Foundation has visited Kerau twice: earlier in the month to conduct quality assurance assessments on the St Anne’s Kerau Primary School Classroom and Kerau Rural Health Aid Post and more recently on Friday 20^th February to do the official launch of these projects. The launch was attended by the people of Aivara, Soupu, Katapi and Ivani which are the villages surrounding Kerau. There are no telecommunication towers through these ranges. Digicel PNG Foundation’s remit is to support health and education structures and programs through PNG, so even though a Digicel tower may not exist in a community, this does not prevent the Foundation from providing support. The situation in Kerau is one that is faced by many of the rural, remote communities all over Papua New Guinea. But despite the lack of basic services in Kerau and the difficulties they face, the people are beautiful, warm, embracing and grateful for being considered in our development work. Francis Karu, a member of the community tells of how grateful the Kerau community is, “mipla hamamas stret lo lukim niupla classroom na aid post kamap lo komuniti blo mipla. Ol pikinini blo mipla save skul lo displa lapun classroom blo ol misin. Namba blo pikinini em bikpela na classroom em liklikk stret na olgeta save paspas lo displa wanpla classroom. Nau yupla wokim niupla classroom na ol pikinini bai gat gutpla hap lo sidaun na wokim ol skul wok blo ol, na ol tisa tu bai gat gutpla office lo wokim wok blo ol. Displa niupla health aid post tu em bai givim bikpla halivim lo ol lain blo mipla. Mipla save wokabout eitpela hours lo go lo Tapini Station lo kisim maraisn lo haus sik blo ol. Planti taim em mipla save karim ol sik man na meri na ol save dai lo rot. Taim ol dai lo rot em mipla save karim ol kam bek lo ples na planim ol. Nau haus sik em stap lo haus dua na mipla hamamas stret bikos ol lain blo mipla bai kisim halivim hariap taim ol sik.” The experiences shared by the people of Kerau are a sobering reminder of the difficulties our people in rural, remote communities face and the need for development, in this instance access to basic services such as education and health. Digicel PNG Foundation is making a small but important contribution towards improving the livelihood of people in rural, remote communities but more certainly needs to be done and the Foundation welcomes any partnership opportunities. The Foundation acknowledges the Member for Goilala, the Late Daniel Mona and also the Governor for Central Province, Honourable Kila Haoda for their partnership and counter-part funding which was instrumental in the completion of these projects.