sauri millennium village sauri millennium village sauri is an eleven-village conglomerate located in the former nyanza province of western kenya and was the first and largest of the fourteen millennium village project (mvp) demonstration sites that ran from 2005 to 2015 in sub-saharan africa. the aim of the mvp in sauri was to halve extreme poverty of villagers living below us$1 between 2000 and 2015. the overarching goal was achieving sustainable development through progress in public health, education, infrastructure, and agricultural productivity.: 2 the experiment in sauri aimed to provide further learnings for kenya's ministry of state of planning, national development (mpnd) to replicate development initiatives in eight other kenyan districts. as well, the lessons would help develop a more comprehensive plan for the kenya vision 2030 for macro-economic growth (kv2030), which is the kenyan government's commitment to realize the millennium development goals and the elimination of poverty by 2030.: 2 although kenya adopted integrated rural development (ird) approaches to target economic growth and poverty since the 1970s, close to eighty percent of the sauri population lived below the us$1 a day poverty line in 2004 (prior to the adoption of the mvp).: 16777 sauri was first chosen due to its high incidence of poverty and hunger. some of the initial mvp interventions were increasing food production, controlling malaria, constructing a functional clinic and safe drinking water points, and building community capacity.: 21 the sauri millennium village project (smvp) began in december 2004 with an annual investment of us$2.75 million, which was a record-breaking monetary amount used to alleviate poverty in an african community of its small size. jeffrey sachs, the mvp founder, described sauri as a village "that's going to make history" and "to end extreme poverty" in the diary of angelina jolie and dr. jeffrey sachs in africa, a 2005 mtv documentary. the degree of success or failure found in the smvp is considered a defining turning point in the development debate – in determining whether developed countries should invest more or reduce foreign development aid. this project's success is under intense scrutiny within kenya. it is widely known that the mvp has shown short-term results in helping sauri establish agricultural, educational, and health programmes, and attracting other financial and infrastructural investments from other ngos. on the other hand, it is argued that these programs lack long-term sustainability, undermine the complexity of poverty, create new yet confusing power structures, and lack clear exit strategies. these issues further challenge the longevity of development in sauri and pose potentially problematic implications.: 191-193 background sauri is located in the siaya county about 50 kilometers north of the third largest city of kisumu in kenya. the county itself is situated in the former nyanza province, in western kenya. smvp is a conglomeration of 11 villages covering a 132 square kilometer area, and consists of a population of approximately 60,000 people.: 66 the luo are the dominant ethnic group in the area and speak the dholo language. the climate is tropical and humid throughout the year in the region. sauri has a bimodal rainfall pattern with the long rains season from march to june and the short rains from september to december. water sources in sauri include protected and unprotected springs, shallow wells, piped water and rainwater harvesting. agriculture is the primary livelihood for residents, with maize, beans, sorghum, and cassava being the most common crops grown in the region. cotton and tobacco are also harvested as the two main cash crops.: 11 most livelihood activities that locals engage in are pertinent to poverty alleviation. beyond subsistence farming, residents also rely on remittances sent from people living and working outside the village.: 66 due to the challenging climate and limited availability of land, sauri is often subject to low crop yields, which is a major cause for food shortage and undernutrition. at the initiation of the mvp, there was a high prevalence of degraded soils resulting from years of nutrient depletion that occurred because farmers could not afford fertilizers.: 339 poor soil conditions further perpetuated low crop yields. prior to the establishment of the millennium village, initial assessments of the district reveal heavy disease burdens in terms of malaria, tuberculosis, hiv infection, high levels of malnutrition, respiratory and diarrheal diseases.: 338 there were limited antimalarial bed nets available and food was generally cooked indoors over fires. in terms of education, there are three primary schools and one secondary school near the western border of sauri.: 67 poverty initiatives and implementations poverty and aid initiatives in rural kenya siaya county in western kenya has a long history of financial aid initiatives.: 39 nyanza province has been the focus of kenyan integrated rural development (ird) approaches since the 1970s, as it is one of the three most impoverished districts of the country.: 37 poor infrastructure, low productivity, and infectious diseases impede poverty alleviation despite efforts from the kenyan government to promote economic development.: 16775 programs such as the district focus for rural development (dfrd) and the constituency development fund (cdf) were introduced in 1983 and 2003, respectively, to support grassroots participation in the implementation of economic development.: 36-37 .</ref> international non-governmental organizations began assistance programs in sauri in the 1990s.: 39 among others, heifer international and care kenya worked with the international centre for research in agroforestry (icraf) and the semi-autonomous government organization kenya agricultural research institute (kari) to assist in poverty alleviation.: 39 in collaboration, local, national, and international non-governmental initiatives provided assistance in agriculture, disease-control, and poverty reduction.: 38 goals as the first and largest millennium village, implementations in sauri began in december 2004.: 19 to overcome the self-perpetuating factors of extreme poverty, the mvp provided the population of sauri with $120 per person annually.: 41 $30 were supplied by the kenyan government, while $60 came directly from the mvp and $20 from other ngos. an additional $10 were contributions from the village through redistribution programs such as the school feeding projects.: 41 the goal of the mvp was to improve four target areas of agricultural productivity, health, education and infrastructure through multiple, simultaneous interventions in two phases.: 16776 during the first phase, a baseline evaluation of sauri was made and local leadership structures were established to engage the community in the four target areas. the second phase put an emphasis on commercialization and connecting sauri to local market structures. agriculture maize-based subsistence farming is the primary economic activity in sauri.: 149 in 2005, the first year of the project, fertilizer and high-yield seeds were introduced to increase the output of maize.: 149 with support of the kenyan ngos, sacred africa, and the teso district-akkuranut development trust, the kenyan ministry of agriculture directly provided training in improved agriculture techniques prior to planting to the people of sauri. while the mvp provided all inputs in 2005, inputs were subsidized by 50% in 2006. for the remaining years, the mvp did not provide subsidies, but helped sauri farmers obtain finance and loan opportunities.: 122 in order to gain access to markets and generate income, a cereal bank was established to store the produce.: 43 from 2006 onwards, additional training in the diversification of crops and various agricultural projects, such as dairy goat farming, beekeeping, and fish farming were sponsored by the mvp.: 127 education through school feeding programs and free education, the mvp sought to increase primary school attendance.: 131 all primary schools in the sauri cluster became part of the school meals program, an initiative based on yield donations from local farmers who were required to donate 10% of their produce to schools in exchange for subsidized seeds and fertilizers.: 16780 other interventions included the construction of primary and secondary schools, new classrooms and the improvement of school infrastructure, electricity and the access to safe drinking water.: 380 educational teacher trainings were provided by local libraries and teacher training colleges through the ministries of education.: 139 the training sessions contributed to greater quality of education while free meals gave the children incentives to enrol. health when first interventions were launched in sauri, there was only one hospital without a doctor to provide care for the entire population.: 380 between 2005 and 2008, three new clinics and a dispensary were built. health personnel was hired and trained with the support of the ministry of health.: 380 in addition to developing better health facilities, one major focus of the mvp was disease control. to stop the spread of malaria, the mvp distributed free insecticide-treated olyset nets to all households of sauri.: 16780 long-lasting malaria prevention was to be achieved through training sessions and the durability of those mosquito nets.: 16780 infrastructure improvements in infrastructure were implemented to increase access to markets, water sources, schools and other institutions.: 149 through turbines and pumps, piped water became available to sauri residents.: 380 further, the mvp subsidized access to an improved electric grid. performance and impacts the outcomes of the smvp's interventions have been varied since the start of its implementation in 2005. in order to evaluate the performance of the smvp, baselines were established using either the conditions of the area prior to the project's execution or the conditions of areas in close proximity to sauri. agriculture agricultural productivity limitedly increased after farmers received fertilizers and improved seeds, and training on diversifying their crops. as a result, about 10.1 more bags of crops per hectare were being produced on average by sauri farmers than those outside the village.: 123 however, whether or not this increment in crop yields increased the farmers’ disposable income to reduce poverty levels is not well understood, because more indicators are needed to track how income expenditure changed over the lifespan of the project. nevertheless, crop diversification on farmland to produce more than just the region's staple maize crop, has helped to spark a transition from subsistence farming to income generation.: 85 education the provision of universal primary education was one of the satisfactory outcomes of the project.: 111 although the kenyan government's set of goals to develop the siaya district cannot be disregarded, the smvp's strategic location unquestionably attracted greater inputs of investment. this led to improvements in four key areas: free primary education, increased school infrastructure, provision of school meal programs, and improved teacher training.: 131 with the enrolment raised to 98% by 2010, all of sauri's 20,400 primary school children are reportedly receiving daily school meals consisting of locally grown food, as more sustainable food practices are developed within the community. in addition, the ranking of the kanyuto sauri primary school has significantly gone up from being in the top 200 to being in the top 10 in the district. this is largely attributed to the better nutritional status of the student body at the school.: 70 however, it has been reported that some children are left out of the lunch meal program if their family fails to provide a designated amount of maize and bean contributions per pupil.: 43 healthcare previous to the initiation of the smvp, the population was victim to critical rates of mother-child mortality, undernutrition, anemia, malaria, and intestinal parasites, amongst other health issues.: 16777 the prevalence rate alone for hiv aids was 30% and 43% for malaria in the population before interventions began.: 99 in response, the mvp introduced the sauri community dispensary to provide healthcare services that were much nearer to access as compared to the hospital they normally had to travel to.: 16777 to tackle the spread of malaria, 513 mosquito nets were distributed to households in 2005.: 4 their performance was not as high as expected, due to the fact that only 57% of villagers used the nets following the indications of the healthcare workers that provided the nets.: 4 nonetheless, they were used on a regular basis and those that were still in good condition five years later presented a statistically low 5.26% prevalence of malaria parasites in one of the household members using the nets.: 8 as a result of the initiatives carried out to reduce the prevalence of malaria and other health concerns particularly in children, public health improved significantly. infrastructure with the development of infrastructure and access to public amenities, the expectation for the price of land was that it would increase significantly as compared to the rate of increase of the area just outside of sauri.: