Self Help Africa

Mango trees provide fruit, shade and income for families we work with. 🥭 🌳

We have supported the planting of mango trees in countries where we work.

Learn more. 👇

The world today faces a great deal of division, which can be barriers to peace and development.

Friendship is one of the most simple and powerful forms of solidarity that can help create a better and more peaceful world. 🌍 🫱🏻‍🫲🏼

Today is International Day of Friendship. To celebrate, meet Alemnesh and Mebet, two great friends we work with, who work together to improve their communities. 💚

🔈 🌾 👩‍🌾 Calling all Churches and Schools! Our Harvest Appeal (UK) launched this week, with FREE resources now available to download from our website, in preparation for your services this Autumn.

By supporting Self Help Africa, you’ll be providing farmers and their families with the tools, knowledge and resources needed to break the cycle of poverty and hunger.

Our Harvest booklet includes inspiring stories of resilience and success, and practical ways you can contribute to this mission. Whether through prayers, donations, fundraising activities, or generating awareness, your support can make a big difference.

For Gift Aid donation envelopes, thank you stickers or a copy of the booklet in the post, just e-mail [email protected] or call us on 01743 277170.

Together we can plant seeds of hope and harvest a future full of promise 💚

Find out more, and download our resources via the link below 👇

Harvest Appeal 2024 Celebrate Harvest 2024 with Self Help Africa - our free resource pack will help you plan your celebration.

Last month, we were proud to be the charity partner of Chef School at Shrewsbury Food Festival, hosted by our friends at Shropshire Festivals and Monks Estate Agents 👨‍🍳🧑‍🍳

Chef School offered festival-goers hourly cook-alongs with a professional chef, including all the ingredients and helpful tuition, to create their own culinary masterpiece!

Huge thanks to head Chef Chris Burt & amazing guest chefs:

Hosts Pantry
Anna Christoforou
James Sherwin
Suki Pantal
Wholefood Warrior
Stuart Collins
Flower & White

& to all of our volunteer helpers for making it all possible 💚

We raised in the region of £1,000 from the class proceeds, donations & a foodie themed raffle 🥳

This year marks the 30th anniversary of formal diplomatic relations between Ethiopia and Ireland. Yesterday, our Ethiopia Country Director Dinkneh Asfaw was amongst NGO leaders who attended a reception to mark the occasion with Tánaiste, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence Micheál Martin.

In discussions with the Tánaiste and Irish Aid Director General Michael Gaffey, Dinkneh showcased the work of Self Help Africa in Ethiopia. We’ve been working on the ground here for 40 years, and our partnership with Irish Aid continues to strengthen as we work to address the Sustainable Development Goals.

Also on the agenda:
- Keeping Ethiopia on the map for Official Development Assistance
- Raising Ireland’s ODA up to 0.7% and increasing climate funding
- Consolidation of positive relations between Ireland and Ethiopia
- Safety net and resilience-building as foundations for crisis prevention and long-term development
- Partnership and capacity building with local organisations in Ethiopia
- Multilateralism as a necessity for tackling global challenges such as climate change.

Earlier in the week, Self Help Africa Kenya Country Director Peter Aluoch also met with the Tánaiste and discussed the UN partnership on peace building and building on the Ireland/Kenya relationship in the context of food systems development.

Nelson Mandela International Day is a chance for us to acknowledge his promotion of a culture of peace throughout the world and a reminder for us all to take action and inspire change. 🌍 🕊️

Through our work at Self Help Africa, we aim to honour Nelson Mandela's fight for the eradication of poverty and the promotion of social justice. 💚

Have you heard of mulching?

This layer of soil locks in moisture and improves soil fertility.

Learn more👇

There are over 3 million co-operatives across the world, providing work and opportunities to 10% of the employed population. 💼

Cooperatives are community-based and an effective way of promoting sustainable development and addressing income inequality, while supporting its members to get a fairer price for their produce.

Today is International Day of Co-operatives with the theme "Cooperatives Build A Better Future For All." 🌍 🤝

We're proud to support and facilitate the formation of many cooperatives through our work, including in Ethiopia where our Savings and Credit Cooperatives (SACCOS) have changed the lives of tens of thousands of people for the better.

📸 Bezina from Abdi Gudina SACCO in her shop, Ethiopia

The impacts of challenges like poverty, climate change, food insecurity, and inadequate healthcare are felt most sharply by rural women.

Our Rural Women Entrepreneurs (RWE) pilot, funded by GIZ and active in Nigeria, Kenya, and Malawi, enhances digital capabilities, health literacy, and economic independence through the establishment of Women’s Business Centres (WBCs).

In just one year:

💼 2,000 women entrepreneurs supported
👩🏽‍🌾 90 Women's Business Centres established
📱 Leveraging social media to trade their goods and services
💵 Savings opportunities

🥗 Nutrition and healthcare information

Read more:

Empowering Rural Women Entrepreneurs To Drive Change Our Rural Women Entrepreneurs pilot, funded by GIZ and active in Nigeria, Kenya, and Malawi, empowers women to transform their communities.

Self Help Africa is set to launch one of its biggest ever projects, aimed at supporting hundreds of new green businesses and creating thousands of jobs in Zambia! ♻️💼

The green enterprises project, GREEN Tech4CE project, is funded by the European Union in Zambia with a €27 million investment, will focus on fostering sustainable green enterprises, particularly benefiting women and young people. 🌱

GREEN Tech4CE will be implemented with Zambia-based Prospero Limited, a company that specialises in supporting innovative private sector growth, Tandem Circular economy consultants, and South Africa-based economic development agency Imani Development.

Read more:

Project will support hundreds of new green businesses A new EU-backed project in Zambia will support thousands of new green businesses and create thousands of jobs.

Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Irish broadcaster Micheál Ó Muircheartaigh, who died earlier this week at the age of 93.

The Kerry-born GAA commentator supported a number of Self Help Africa fundraising events, including our 2018 Croke Park Challenge.

Micheál was a friend and generous supporter of events run by our colleague Alan Kerins, and at the age of 83 led Alan’s ‘Sam to the Summit’ ascent of Carrauntoohil with the Sam Maguire Cup, a decade ago. The event raised over €100,000 for Africa.

Ní bheidh a leithéidí arís ann.

Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) account for 90% of businesses, more than 70% of employment, and 50% of GDP worldwide. MSMEs are vital to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG 8 - Decent Work For All and Economic Growth. 📈 🤝

Today is Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Day with the theme: 'Leveraging MSMEs to Accelerate Sustainable Development and Eradicate Poverty in Times of Multiple Crises'. 🌍 💼

At Self Help Africa, several of our programmes support small and medium sized enterprises - with the objective of creating secure markets for farming households, jobs, and income generating activities within rural poor communities.

This work ranges from activities that improve local access credit and small loans so that people can start their own small scale income generating enterprises, supporting farmers groups and cooperatives to operate as profitable businesses, and providing business skills training to households so that they can run their small farms as family run micro-enterprises.

There are several larger scale projects supporting agri-enterprise too, specifically:

👩‍🌾 In Kenya, the Agrifi Kenya Challenge Fund backed by the European Union in Kenya has integrated over 166,000 small farmers into inclusive value chains where they benefited from better access to markets, farming supplies, credit facilities and training.

💼 The European Commission funded ENTERPRISE Zambia Challenge Fund has created around 4,000 full time jobs and indirectly benefited up to 250,000 people.

♀️Our Rural Women Entrepreneurs (RWE) pilot has supported nearly 2,000 women entrepreneurs across Kenya, Nigeria, and Malawi. We’ve established 90 Women’s Business Centres, fostering networks of women with support to launch new business ventures.

📸 Members of Kasev Mbaageh Women's Association, Nigeria

Have you heard of Mbeya manure?

This homemade manure reduces the amount of fertiliser needed and increases crop yields.

Learn more 👇

The importance of supporting local responders - often best placed to take the lead in the delivery of aid - is stepping up in Malawi, in the face of extreme weather events that have increased humanitarian needs in the southern African country.

In this article from Devex, Madalitso Kateta looks at how Malawi's disaster response capacity is being strengthened through localization, and how the capacity of community-based organisations to respond to natural disasters is increasing. Destruction wrought by Tropical Storm Ana in 2022 and Cyclone Freddy last year has made this all the more pressing.

In the piece, Self Help Africa’s Country Director Kate Hartley-Louis says however that to deliver on the targets being set, international NGOs needed to standardise their due diligence and partnership procedures, while local organisations needed to be registered and in compliance with the standards required by the NGO Regulatory Authority.

Kate explained how local NGOs are doing great work on the ground, but if they are not registered and not compliant they aren’t eligible to receive partnership funding in line with the new regulations.

Self Help Africa are co-chairs of the NGO Humanitarian committee in Malawi, a group of national and international NGOs that are working to improve coordination and collaboration in humanitarian space. Our new Malawi Strategy commits the organisation to delivering 30% of its portfolio through local partners by 2027 - in line with the proposed new regulations in the country.

Read more:

Building Malawi's disaster response capacity through localization After benefiting from a Save the Children localization, project community based organizations in southern Malawi have enhanced their capacity to respond to natural disasters and attract funding.

Poverty, conflict and increasingly, climate change, are major factors that continue to displace millions of people across the world every year.

Today is World Refugee Day, an opportunity to highlight the strength and courage of refugees worldwide. The 2024 theme is: "For a world where refugees are welcomed."

At Self Help Africa, we aim to provide refugees with opportunities to thrive by using their skills, talents and passion to earn a living, support their families and contribute to their local communities.

In Adjumani District, Uganda, with the support of Irish Aid, we're working with farming households to improve their access to and consumption of sustainable, diverse and nutritious food. These farmers are also enhancing their sustainable and resilient farming practices and business development skills with our support.

In partnership with the World Food Programme, we're working with smallholder farmers in refugee and host communities in Adjumani and Kiryandongo – particularly women and young people – to sustainably increase their food production, improve their nutritional intake and secure an income.

In Kiryandongo, we work with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to do likewise, including by providing business development services to refugee and host community households and promote sustainable water systems for climate-sensitive farming.

Read more:

Self Help Africa: Working For a World Where Refugees Are Welcomed World Refugee Day raises awareness of the rights of refugees and highlights the plight of those fleeing conflict or persecution.

For we have a simple message for the Government: There is No Time To Lose

As Dóchas members, we are calling on the Irish Government to:

▪️Make real progress towards spending 0.7% of GNI on ODA by 2030 - by increasing the ODA budget in 2025 by €292m and publish a pathway to achieve this.

▪️Deliver on our commitment of €225m per annum of climate finance at a minimum, with a pathway to increase this allocation to Ireland’s actual ‘fair share’ of €500m per year.

▪️Ensure 25% of all Irish ODA is allocated to locally-led humanitarian, development and peace initiatives that can deliver support directly to affected populations.

📣 We’re hiring: Institutional Funding Manager - Remote (home-based UK or Ireland with occasional travel to London/Dublin/country offices).

Join the Self Help Africa team and play an important role in our institutional income-generating activities.

You’ll work closely with assigned country teams - writing high-quality bids, supporting pipeline development, donor engagement and positioning for contract and grant opportunities.

Do you have:
▪️ Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to creatively turn complex information into compelling proposals?
▪️ Evidence of success in developing proposals and securing funding from institutional donors?
▪️ The ability to form good working relationships with colleagues across the organisation and with partners in multiple locations?
▪️ A minimum of three years’ experience in roles which included programme funding?

If this sounds like you, we’d love to hear from you! Please share with anyone in your network who may be interested too.
Learn more and apply: https://selfhelpafrica.org/ie/institutional-funding-manager/

Our land is one of our most precious resources but it's decreasing at an alarming rate. Africa loses an estimated 5 million hectares of forest area per year while land degradation affects about 230 million hectares annually, according to Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) 🏜️

Increasing levels of drought pose a huge threat to the livelihoods and the food security of farming families, causing the forced migration of tens of millions of people.

Today is World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought with the theme: "United for Land. Our Legacy. Our Future."

At Self Help Africa, regenerative agriculture and restoration are at the core of our work. We're part of the Global EverGreening Alliance 'Restore Africa' - the world's largest community-led land restoration initiative - which aims to restore 1.9 million hectares of land across six African countries. It will directly support 1.5 million smallholder farming families and see three million trees planted in Kenya alone! 🌱 🌳

Let's restore our land and ensure that it's used sustainably for future generations! 💚

Happy Father's Day to all the fantastic dads we work with every day across Africa.

Our work with farming families helps parents to earn more income and provide a brighter future for their children. 💚

📸
Becky, Patience and Christopher - Nigeria
Bernard, Zedy, Elisha, Abagail, and Faith - Kenya
Poni with his family - Uganda
Sisay and Kelemua - Ethiopia

A huge congratulations to President of Ireland and patron of Self Help Africa, Michael D. Higgins, who last week became the first Irish person to be awarded the prestigious Agricola Medal of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

The Agricola Medal recognises individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to efforts to advance global food security, nutrition and poverty alleviation .

President Higgins is a much-valued supporter of the work of Self Help Africa, the wider international development sector in Ireland, as well as a staunch advocate for those furthest behind, for progressing the SDGs and bringing attention to issues such as the climate crisis and global hunger.

At a ceremony last Friday attended by Self Help Africa CEO Feargal O'Connell, President Higgins spoke of his vision for achieving global food security - no easy task given the many crises facing our world. This vision includes prioritising small-scale farming in Africa through inclusive and environmentally sustainable approaches.

From all of us at Self Help Africa, congratulations President Michael D. Higgins on this well-deserved honour.

Image credit: Maxwells Photography

President Higgins is pictured receiving the Agricola Medal from FAO Director General Dr. Qu Dongyu.

Have you heard of 'Tom Brown' before? It's not a person, but rather, a recipe!

This traditional Nigerian food supplement is made with a combination of different cereals and locally sourced products like soya beans, millet, corn and groundnuts.

Usually eaten as a porridge, it's especially beneficial for young children and breastfeeding women as its high nutritional content supports weight gain.

Read more:

Tom Brown: Supporting Women, Children and Rural Communities in Nigeria Tom Brown is a traditional Nigerian food supplement made with a combination of different cereals and locally sourced products.