A MOORLAND terrace cottage in a remote spot on the North Yorkshire Moors has become the nerve centre for a marathon plan to aid one of the world's poorest people - rural residents in northern Ghana.

Behind the challenging task is a former nun, Moira Austin, who spent 25 years in Ghana as a teacher and missionary before moving to the beauty spot of Rosedale East high on the moors.

She went to Ghana as a missionary while a sister with the Order of the Holy Paraclete, which is based at Sneaton Castle, Whitby, and became a teacher and development worker.

Her love for Ghana grew with her appointment as principal of an African vocational training college in Bolgatanga on the edge of the Sahara Desert and she became the diocesan project officer in the Tamale area. Her inspiration helped create 11 schools for the poverty-stricken families and two training centres where women are taught how to generate income to help their family budgets, and catering.

In addition, said Ms Austin, the projects have seen the setting-up of a home for babies suffering from malnutrition, schemes for the blind, well-digging and agricultural ventures.

Known as the Timnabang Centre, it has been set up by Tamale Diocesan Development Group (TADDEG) a charitable trust supported by individuals and organisations such as Bread for the World and World Aid UK and it has its base at Ms Austin's home where the chairman of the group, the Rev Anne Jenkins, also lives and from where they mastermind their operation through the internet.

"It is a very disadvantaged area," said Ms Austin. "But we believe we can help these people to help themselves and give themselves a better future."

Most of the projects she helped establish are now run by their own management committees. One, for instance, has seen diesel engines fitted to grinding mills, which previously had to be operated by hand.

Ms Austin was head of a community school for 12 years in Ghana. She returned to England in 1989 when the order handed its work over to the Anglican Church.

But some time later, she was asked by the Bishop of Tamale, the Rt Rev Emmanuel Arongo, to return and help with vocational training for young people. "They are very poor. The schools have no books or pencils - they have nothing," she said.

While education is supposedly free, the children have to take their own makeshift desk and chair to school.

"Students in these villages are isolated from the wider world and more disadvantaged. Even if they get good results in their examinations, their parents are unable to find the fees for secondary schooling in the nearby towns. In the new global society of the 21st century, these village children are being pushed more and more to the margins."

The TADDEG group, she said, is trying to raise funds to change this cycle of isolation by introducing solar-powered computers into four pilot villages.

"We want to set up a training centre in Bolgatanga to give promising young people from the villages a basic training in IT and to teach them to train others. In four pilot villages, we will use solar energy to power computers and we will provide educational software, training and technical assistance. Eventually we hope that cellular technology will allow e-mail and internet access."

To set up a solar-powered unit in each village will cost £3,500. But there are additional costs involved in the overall programme.

She is hoping to raise £40,000 to get the project up and running. With darkness lasting 12 hours from 6 pm to 6 am, solar power is vital, she said.

Ms Austin trained as a primary school teacher in Newcastle before joining the Holy Paraclete. "I am a very practical person," she said. She did an MA in development studies at Leeds University and worked with disfunctional families in the parish of All Hallows in Leeds where the Rev Jenkins was the vicar.

So far, some £1,200 has been sent to the TADDEG headquarters at Rosedale East. "It's a good start but we have a very long way to go," said Ms Austin.

Bids are now being made to the National Lottery and Comic Relief. "We are hoping to get sufficient funds to start the project in September," she added.

When she is not exploring new ideas to raise the money, Ms Austin is a volunteer teacher at the village school in Rosedale helping the youngsters with their computer studies.

"We are desperately seeking help for this project because we know it will work and £40,000 will make a tremendous difference to so many very deprived children and young people."

Anyone able to help is asked to contact Ms Austin at 28 Hill Cottages, Rosedale East, Pickering, YO18 8RG; tel (01751) 417879.

Updated: 11:06 Thursday, January 10, 2002