HELP International

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.:MESSAGE FROM OUR CEO
 
 
         
A CEO must be talented in many things to carry out world class programs. The area of website maintenance is still quite new to me.   In this first of what I hope will be regular web-site reports to the public I wish to provide in synopsis a Narrative Overview, Special Programs Feature and Wishlist.                                                                                                                                                              

 Narrative Overview

HELP International was founded in 1993.  I had high aspirations for what we could achieve in perfecting the art and science of helping.   HELP and its community partnership programs have achieved national and international prominence.           

 Programs and Wishlist

Our current programs fall into four major groupings:

1)      Zero waste community management
HELP is developing low cost techniques and technologies for recycling new parts of the waste stream into valuable new products.  Examples of HELP's innovations to date include:
  • A low-cost paper mill that can produce 500 kg of paper pulp per day. 
  • A low-cost fiber board manufacturing process.
  • Styrofoam milling to create soil conditioners for tree nurseries (HELP has a production capacity of 10 cubic meters per day).
  • 9,000 sq foot grain bag recycling to create mulch pads for trees (HELP currently holds an inventory of 220,000 mulch pads).
  • Manufacture of bio-degradable tree mulch pads from cardboard (HELP is ready for production of any level for this technology which HELP has proven in field applications). 
Current status:  No outside funding.  HELP in 2010 sold its first 55,000 tree mulch pads at $0.30 each. 
 
Funding needs:
  • HELP currently wishes to embark on a marketing campaign for its granulated styrofoam.
  • HELP also wishes funding to develop markets for its bio-degradable cardboard mulch pads. 
  • HELP also wishes funding to develop markets for fiberboard, raw paper pulp and handmade paper.

Funding required for above:  $30,000.

2)      Phytoremediation programming
  • Stream margin forestation:  installation of three row bio-diverse tree belts along 220 km of cultivated stream margins in 17 municipalities in Southern Saskatchewan. 
  • Landfill forest caps and surround forest filters:  using special tree species to control and neutralize many harmful landfill leachates.
  • Effluent irrigation woodlots:  diverting waste water nutrient flows from entering the river system by diverting them for bio-remediation in intensive woodlots. 
  • Soil salinity reversal using high water use trees around municipal lagoon and on farms below water dams.
Current funding status:  HELP carries out forestry installations of 100,000 trees per year currently using free trees provided by government and carrying out cost recovery programming with private landowners and municipalities.  This is the only program of its kind in Canada in which landowners are not paid to carry out stream margin forestation but who in fact pay HELP for 50% of the programming costs.
 
Outside funding requirements for installation of 100,000 trees:   $50,000 (representing 50% of program cost not covered).
3)       Aggressive research in tree production, phytoremediation applications, horticulture, and recycling technology development.
Current research set includes: 
  • Effluent irrigation trials: testing the effects on tree health of different forms of effluent including raw effluent, grey water, salt water and normal river water.
  • Oil spill bio-remediation research:  testing the capacity of different species of trees to metabolize oil thereby decontaminating soil saturated with oil spills.
  • 2nd year trials in developing super low cost trees by growing thousands of tree cuttings in recycled styrofoam blocks in a farm dugout as a zero maintenance tree production method. 
  • Research to create drought resistant tomatoes:  this research follows trials in 2009 and 2010 to test whether simple techniques of root training in a vegetable nursery can create deep fibrous root tomatoes that will be drought resistant and require far less irrigation.  This is meant for countries in Africa where easy water access is an issue.
  • Fiberboard manufacture up scaling:  this research will modify HELP's existing invention of the 2 x 2 ft fiberboard press to create a 4 x 8 foot fiberboard which will have far more applications in industrial construction of sound barriers and use as building insulation.
Note: Additional research is being defined apart from the five items above mentioned.
 
Funding status:  HELP has never applied for nor received outside funding for its research branch.  HELP runs the program using predominantly volunteer interns who come from France, Spain, Kenya and Canada.  HELP wishes to access funding to upgrade the benefits and the equipment used in this exciting research programming. 
 
Funding requirement:  $30,000.
4)      Live-in ecology camps for students of all ages.
HELP hosts schools and groups of all ages to live at HELP's farm based Center for Ecology and Research which is also home to a simulated African village with real mud and thatch housing and filled with traditional and appropriate environmentally friendly technology such as brick presses, vegetable oil presses, roof tile manufacturing unit, traditional and appro-technology mills and many more.  Student groups live onsite for one to three days at a time while they learn hands-on technologies and contribute to research.  HELP promises student groups that the experience will be the most fun, difficult, challenging, and life-changing outdoor education experience of their lives.
 
Funding Status: HELP receives 50% of the cost from the participating groups themselves.  HELP works to access the other 50% from outside sources.   Schools bear a large burden in raising funds for bussing which is the largest cost born by the school.  Feeding groups of up to 60 students living on site is a major cost as is the cost of vehicle fuel, and program equipment and expendable materials.
 
Current year funding requirement: $30,000.
 
In addition to the continuation of current programs, funding requirements for two new areas have been identified:
 
1)      Patent protection
HELP seeks funding to patent protect four of its most important inventions and techniques.  Patenting will allow HELP to market this technology to North American firms (particularly HELP's forestry innovations).  HELP provides its intellectual property and its technologies at cost of production to African communities.   Marketing to North American firms will create an alternative base of funding for HELP's research and for its Africa programming which includes Books for Africa, National Women Led Agro-Forestry Program in Kenya, and Slum Conversion Program in Kenya. HELP hopes to bring its four most important inventions to at least a Patent Pending stage soon.
 
Funding sought for patent protection costs:  $40,000.
2)      Journal of the Helping Sciences
HELP hopes to publish the first annual Journal of the Helping Sciences. The journal will publish the research and development work of volunteer interns from around the world and Canada who come to HELP for this purpose. The journal will make these sacrificing volunteer researchers to be published researchers.  The journal will prevent exploitation of HELP’s new inventions, technologies and processes by having them enter the public domain under this publication and become available to the wider world community.
 
Funding sought for the production, publishing and distribution of the First Edition of the Journal of the Helping Sciences:  $35,000.
 
 

 © HELP International 2014