In Zambia, climate change has devastating effects. 40 percent of children suffer from malnutrition. Devastating droughts and floods lead to drastic crop failures, forcing many families to reduce their meals. Often, there is only enough food for one meal a day.
Your donation makes a difference! With your support, we can help needy families with food security. Our project provides needy mothers with training in climate-adapted agriculture, livestock breeding and honey production. Herewith we enable families to secure their crop yields despite climate changes so that they can adequately nourish their children in the long term.
Year after year, long periods of drought, combined with high temperatures, torrential rain and extreme winds, are drastically curtailing farming families’ harvests. Animals are dying in the fields because the watering holes have dried up. The weather is unpredictable, threatening people’s livelihoods. Most are self-sufficient farmers. In recent years, reduced crop yields and failed harvests have plunged many families into poverty. Fifty-eight percent of the population live in extreme poverty.
The Choma district in southern Zambia is particularly affected by climate change. Many water sources have dried up and most families with no access to safe drinking water are forced to drink from unsafe sources. Furthermore, animals and plants are being afflicted by disease and pests, inflicting further heavy losses on smallholders.
Children are the biggest losers: the lack of food has a negative impact on their physical development. Because of the droughts, children are often forced to contribute to the family income through child labour, early marriage, street vending or begging and are, thereby, unable to go to school.
Our project supports children and their mothers, who, as farmers, must adapt their way of life to climate change. We are, therefore, training 200 “lead farmers” in climate-adapted, sustainable agriculture and chicken farming. We are also distributing drought-resistant, fast-maturing seedlings and seeds for drought-resistant vegetables.
The courses also include training in agricultural diversification, crop rotation and the production of organic fertiliser. These lead farmers then pass on what they have learned to ten mothers organised in self-help groups.
We are training 200 mothers in the production and marketing of honey to enable them to have an additional source of income and, thereby, provide for their children.
Drought-resistant, early maturing seedlings and seeds such as black-eyed peas allow farmers to produce high protein yields within a short time, thereby, contributing to food security. We are also setting up gardens at ten schools and demonstration fields in twelve communities, on which innovative farming methods can be demonstrated.
In response to the water shortages, we are repairing wells and building 15 new wells to make clean drinking water available to pupils and people in the communities.
Below, you have the opportunity to support the children and their families in Zambia by becoming a project sponsor or making a donation.
Any donation you provide will help enable the people of Zambia to feed their children. With your support, we can help local people restructure their farming procedures. We are, thereby, giving them the opportunity to protect crops and secure harvests in the long term despite climatic change.
