Last spring Dickinson Magazine highlighted the ways Peter Bechtel ’81 works to alleviate poverty and preserve nature in Southern Africa. Then, in the fall, Bechtel and his wife, Ruth, came to Carlisle to visit his parents—Professor Emeritus of Religion Daniel Bechtel and Librarian Emerita Joan Bechtel—and to speak on campus about their life and work in Mozambique.

What Peter Bechtel didn’t know was that just a few months later, he would receive enough help from fellow Dickinsonians to avert a famine.

Mozambique has never been easy. During his 21 years there, Peter Bechtel has faced hardships that would make most people cut and run, but he and Ruth have persevered, building a family, a home, a farm and, since Peter Bechtel tends to think big, in 2002 he created Quirimbas National Park—the largest marine-protected area in all of Africa.

The Bechtels are people who, when presented with a problem, find a solution.

This winter, the problem was famine.

Quirimbas National Park is 3,000 square miles on Mozambique’s pristine coast, with 40,000 people living within its boundaries. While the park’s residents live on some of the most beautiful land on earth, they also live in profound poverty.

Bechtel has been working hard on the problem. He’s created fish refuges that have increased overall fishing resources. On land, a program of elephant management helps to defend crops against pachyderm invasion by using caustic oil from chili peppers.

But Bechtel didn’t have a ready solution for drought.

The 2003-04 rainy season in coastal Mozambique has been anything but wet. Farmers planted yams in November and got no rain until after Christmas. The crops died. They planted again around New Year’s, and no rain fell in January, leaving farmers with dead crops and no reserve of seeds.

It was a recipe for famine.

“The park staff made a rapid assessment of the coastal area and estimated that the crisis would affect about 25,000 people,” Bechtel says. “The Oxfam humanitarian food-aid program was alerted to the possibility of a food crisis.”

But, Bechtel says, while emergency food distribution is sometimes necessary, it’s never a happy choice for development workers.

“It tends to increase people’s dependence on handouts and to reduce self-reliance,” he says. So he began to think about how to solve the problem.

Turns out, help was only 8,000 miles away—in Carlisle.

“In early February we heard that drought had ruined the yam crop,” says Mara Donaldson, professor of religion and longtime follower of Bechtel’s work.

Donaldson connected with students and faculty at the Women’s Center, of which she is co-adviser. They became excited about sponsoring the fund raising for the “seeds project.” Priscilla Laws, research professor of physics, came on board, bringing with her loads of support from the science departments.

Word spread like fire.

Townspeople and folks from the surrounding area jumped in. Members of the Unitarian Church in Boiling Springs offered support, too. There was no time to spare—new seeds had to be purchased for the people of Quirimbus before the rains came and went.

Contributions came in, big and small. A nickel here, $100 there. And, thanks to electronic banking, the first $2,000 was in Mozambique in a matter of days, already buying seeds.

Bechtel bought sorghum seeds, a crop that had once been a staple in Mozambique until it had been replaced by yams. In Quirimbas, they planted the seeds. It rained. The sorghum sprouted and, as if to prove people can make a difference, famine was averted.

“This has been 100 percent successful,” Donaldson says of the seeds project. The campus-led effort raised more than $4,000. Because the new seeds are not hybrid varieties, the plants are sustainable, so part of the money will go toward the storage and care of next year’s seeds.

“Everyone was instrumental,” Donaldson says. “Priscilla, the Women’s Center, the Unitarians, faculty and students in departments all over campus, townspeople. They rose to the occasion. Every dollar provides two families with the grain they need for this season and next,” she says. “This is a great model for what a college can do and how it can involve students.”

Alison Egic ’04 agrees. “Having met Peter and Ruth Bechtel in October … I felt this was a project to which Dickinson really had a connection. I studied in West Africa for a semester while at Dickinson and saw firsthand how much food just one dollar could produce. When people understand exactly how their donations can have an impact on the lives of others, they become very generous.”

This story began two decades ago, when Bechtel went to Africa. But it doesn’t end here. Donaldson foresees endless possibilities for Dickinsonians in Mozambique—field work, internships, interdisciplinary scholarship.

“This is about environmental science, anthropology, religious studies, languages, women’s issues … and there’s so much more,” she says. “It’s liberal arts—the coming together of wonderful possibilities.”
Stay tuned. •
—Barbara Snyder Stambaugh