The heart and soul of The Hunger Site's mission

The heart and soul of The Hunger Site's mission, to help eradicate world hunger, is rooted in the struggle against poverty and hopelessness. Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, is a part of that battleground. Eighty percent of the population lives under the poverty line, vulnerable to the country's all-too-frequent natural and socio-economic disasters.

In the past decade, the news from Haiti has been heart-wrenching. Entire communities and the crops they depend upon were repeatedly devastated by tremendous storms. Deforestation, exacerbated by charcoal production to cook or buy food, led to topsoil loss in a region where two-thirds of the population relies on sustenance farming. And word reached the world of people so desperate for food that they ate cookies of dirt mixed with a little fat and baked in the sun.

But Haiti is a place of hope as well as tragedy. In 1804, Haiti became the first black republic to declare independence. During the early days of the earthquake, that surviving spirit was visible to the world. Aid organizations could not immediately reach all of the Haitian population in desperate need of rescue, but that did not stop Haitians from helping each other. They fought to dig survivors out from the rubble with their bare hands. They treated wounds with what little they had. And amid unimaginable tragedy, survivors with nothing more than the clothes upon their back faced the dark nights together, lifting their voices in song.

At The Hunger Site, we are proud to support the Haitian people in their time of need.

Partners in Health has been working in Haiti for more than twenty years not only to provide direct aid for those in need, but also to train Haitians to become doctors, nurses, and medical staff. Now more than ever, every one of those Haitians is better equipped to save lives, and PIH is on the ground to help them accomplish that goal. Donations to The Hunger Site to aid earthquake survivors go directly and swiftly to Partners in Health for emergency supplies and aid

Hillside Allotment Garden

On December 13th, people were welcomed to the HILLSIDE ALLOTMENT GARDEN (Utanon alang sa Masanag nga Kaugmaon). This new garden was established through the joint efforts of the Community in Sitio Hillside, Barangay Lapasan, the City of Cagayan de Oro and Xavier University’s Periurban Vegetable Project (PUVeP). Financial support was offered by the Allotment Garden Association of Sint-Amandsberg (“Volkstuinen Slotenkouter”) and the Provincial Government of East-Flanders (Ghent, Belgium). Technical assistance was provided by the German Development Cooperation (CIM).

Who could ever deny that allotment gardens merit to be promoted as one of the best practices to combat desertification, hunger and poverty ? Any time wars on this planet have disturbed the global life (see World War I and II), allotment gardens have been created everywhere on pieces of barren land. They have saved thousands of lives of poor people by offering them a chance to produce their own bit of food and the necessary vitamins and mineral elements for their children. As a young boy, I have seen myself the success stories of a number of allotment gardens in Flanders during and after World War II, and I can assure you that, even nowadays, numerous people in my country Belgium are still enthusiastic about these splendid opportunities offered by our cities and villages.

Imagine what such allotment gardens could signify for people in the drylands or for the most unfortunate ones in the refugee camps all over this world. This is one of the reasons why I still don’t understand why international aid organizations, donors and NGOs do not concentrate their efforts on the creation of gardens, be it allotment gardens, family gardens or school gardens, to provide food security for millions of people.

Could someone tell me why such gardens can be created thanks to individual efforts of some small associations or organizations, like the Allotment Gardens Slotenkouter and the Provincial Government of East-Flanders in Belgium, and why such a “best practice” is not yet applied at the global scale, thanks to the financial support of important international donors ? Could this be discussed within the UNCCD ? Could this be studied as a possible theme for some famous Foundations ?

Or, shall we continue for ages to send masses of food to hungry people at regular intervals, or shouldn’t we change our strategy and start creating gardens everywhere ? With my Chinese friends I say : “Don’t give them food, teach them how to grow it !“, even in the desert.

For many years already I have been building an e-mail network for people interested in desertification, poverty and dryland gardening. Recently, I opened a part of this blog to “container gardening“. The main reason for the establishment of such a network is that I noticed, when speaking with my colleagues of the Committee for Science and Technology (CST) of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), that we all spend a lot of time searching the internet for interesting publications concerning our fields of interest. Everyone is looking for the same information, spending considerable time to find mostly the same articles, all of us reading these texts to see if their content is important enough, and if it is, to use that info for our own purposes.

There is no general communication whatever between the members of the CST and between many more people interested in desertification, poverty, agriculture, horticulture and sustainable development. It does not suffice to send them the addresses of interesting websites, because not all the articles on that sites deal with dryland gardening, desertification, poverty, sustainable development or container gardening, so that we all have to start again searching and reading the content of the different sites. In other words: we all waste the same amount of time !

Therefore, I started selecting messages on these topics and all related subjects that can be important for people interested in the issues mentioned above and republishing the texts (some entirely, some partly) on my blog, so that my visitors do not have to switch again to all those websites to look for the entire texts they possibly want to read. My main aim is to reflect the diversity of publications on these topics. Thereby, I try to ease up the access to a panoply of articles and stories and to a panoply of sites and blogs. From time to time, I am also publishing my own contributions, mostly about my own experience with ways and means to improve plant growth in the drylands with a minimum of water and fertilizer.

Some people seem to be not so happy with this system, claiming their property rights. If so, I respect their views. I do not wish to harm their proper interests, whatever their objectives to create a public site or blog may be. I only tried to bring the attention of thousands of people worldwide to their messages.

Again, for me all this is a question of offering time-saving to my readers. This is not MY BLOG, it is OURS for I am only the administrator to easy up the work of many colleagues and friends. My blog visitors seem to be very happy with this system, as I offer them a chance to save plenty of time by aggregating valuable information on all aspects of the topics in a sort of newsletter, in which I (re)publish that what seems to be of some interest to most of us. This way, we all save time for more practical things to do and meanwhile we bring interesting websites and blogs to the attention of many more people worldwide than one single site or blog could do for itself.

Personally, I spend this time for collecting and aggregating the info because I am a retired professor of the Ghent University (Belgium) and I want to serve my colleagues and friends in an efficient way, without any other personal advantage than having the pleasure to serve and to do it the best way I can.

Of course, I mention always the source of the info I collect from the internet, so that the visitors of my blog can be immediately linked to my sources and go to these websites for additional interesting messages. Moreover, I am listing the links with important sites and blogs under my “Blogroll”, so that visitors of my blog can click directly the website’s address.

Observations, remarks, critics or additional ideas are always welcome. I also hope to find ways and means to improve cooperation and networking between people working for closely related websites. There is still a lot of improvement and collaboration to realize. Let’s do it together, in full respect for the work achieved by all of us, instead of “combating” each other in the battle of worldwide information!

SABINET

Corporate social responsibility:

In 2008/9, Sabinet continued to focus it’s CSR activities on the educational and social development of deserving communities in South Africa. In addition to formal corporate initiatives, Sabinet staff have contributed generously of their time and personal funds to assist in a number of projects.

The company donates 10% of its pre-tax profits to the Sabinet Chairperson’s Fund which then identifies, executes and actively manages and administers all CSR initiatives. Sabinet also made additional ad hoc contributions to the Fund over the past two years, bringing the average annual contribution to the Fund to 17% of profits before taxation.

The Fund was established in 2003 and registered as a Public Benefit Organisation in 2006. It ensures Sabinet’s CSR efforts receive the undiluted focus they deserve and that they remain sustainable and capable of delivering real long term value. All projects are closely monitored to ensure that they make a real difference to people’s lives.

Projects undertaken in 2008/9 include enterprise development, Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET), community library assistance, educational sponsorship of school children and support for various charities that uplift and empower young people in the community.

We believe these initiatives make a real difference in people’s lives. While the funds we contribute are essential and much appreciated by the communities, it is the passionate input and commitment of our staff that drive these projects forward and ensure that the communities truly benefit.

Koketso Nkuna’s computer training business, Shoma Institute for Computer Training, has grown significantly since 2007 when she was first sponsored by the Chairperson’s Fund with the donation of seven new computers to facilitate computer training courses at community libraries in Tshwane on behalf of Tshwane Community Library and Information Services.

In 2008, she expanded her business from the Mamelodi West community library, establishing new branches in Soshanguwe, Saulsville and Bodibeng. She also re-introduced training at Wespark Primary School. She is in the process of obtaining SETA accreditation for the courses.

A number of primary and high school pupils have since 2007 received a sponsorship from the Chairperson’s Fund to cover school fees, stationery, uniforms, trips and school sporting activities. The Fund broadened its focus in 2008 to sponsor more children in different regions with school uniforms and stationery. This is a project that Sabinet personnel have taken a personal interest in, becoming directly involved in liaising with the relevant schools to identify children in need and to purchase the necessary items for them.

TSWELOPELE UPLIFTMENT PROJECT

Tswelopele Upliftment Project (TOP-UP) an inter-denominationalorganisation were born 10 years ago through the passion and heart of God in the community for the community. There’s an Eastern proverb that says it’s useless to fight darkness, it’s rather better to light up a candle.Tswelopele is a Sotho word meaning to lift up, empower and to liberate people.This is what this project of the community in the community for the community is all about.

Today TOP-UP consist of a vibrant evangelist department with a woman’s ministry, children’s ministry, youth ministry, HIV&AIDS orphans and farm ministry (Morgan Beef) and a home based care unit for the terminally ill patients. (HIV&AIDS)

Job creation projects consisting of Hosios Christian Crèche, Pre-Primary and Primary School, Needlework project, screen-printing feeding scheme and vegetable gardens.

Top-Up Upliftment Project, founded in 1998,is a grassroots service NGO working with marginalized communities in the Delmas- Botleng areas.Its mission is to addresspoverty holistically by joining hands with Local Government, churches and business sector in order to address and support the needs of the society by providing education, jobs, health facilities and welfare. It focuses its work on improving the status of women, children and youth, through direct support and increased access to knowledge and information about the links between HIV&AIDS and other social concerns such as poverty, agriculture, nutrition, gender and general health. Our vision is to create a healthy, wealthy and educated society that will lead others in becoming responsible and dignified.

OBJECTIVES

The organisations objectives are:

•Helping to discover their personal worth

•Creating employment and training opportunities

•Help with accommodation

•Teach people to be self - supporting

•Working with local Goverment to create opportunities for improved living conditions

•The organisation is a Christian based organisation and as such will also base all it's activities on Christian princepals and ethics.