World Food Day – Double your donation
This year the world is facing the worst humanitarian crisis since 1945, with millions of people across East Africa in the midst of, or facing famine. I've found it startling how little the media have shared this, with our news dominated by US and UK politics.
Yet, in South Sudan, a country we started supporting last year, over 40% of the population are in urgent need of food and agricultural support. In the last months we have been busy responding, distributing emergency food supplies, farming tools and seeds, and providing agricultural training; impacting over 1,100 people. As I've shared in previous blogs (THE DYING SHED) this project really has been providing support to the worlds most vulnerable. The displaced families we're supporting are in a desperate IDP (internally displaced persons) camp inside South Sudan, with harrowing conditions.
This project is supporting 210+ of the most vulnerable families, all struggling with significant health challenges (TB, HIV etc.) or physical or mental disabilities (including leprosy, blindness etc.). I will never forget both the heart breaking and inspiring hours I spent in this camp in July, truly one of the most challenging experiences I've had in life. Heartbreaking as I witnessed some of the worst living conditions imaginable, like this household of 3 elderly blind men (two pictured above), literally living on the edge of existence and reliant on the support of HHA. Inspiring, as I found hope being given to the hopeless through our support. As one example, meeting the lady below who was a widow with leprosy. She stopped tending to the harvest we'd provided her as we approached, and instead greeted us with a smile, sharing how grateful she was for our support. In reality I felt awkward receiving her thanks, knowing how poorly the western world I'm from had been responding to this crisis. Probably no one reading this blog will ever know the devastating pain or hopelessness of realising you've literally exhausted every possibility of feeding yourself or your family. It would be impossible for me to try and express in words the weight of desperation this causes to those parents I met, desperately seeking to provide for their children.
But today, on World Food Day, we have the opportunity to make a real difference. Thanks to Global Giving, every £ or $ we donate towards our South Sudan work via the link below will be doubled. Not only that, but if we get the most donations or the largest total, Global Giving have additional financial prizes on offer to assist our on-going work. Please celebrate World Food Day with us now, by supporting some of the most vulnerable families in South Sudan. We need your support to continue food distributions through 2017 and into 2018 and would be grateful of your support.
