Our Projects
We have a passion to create self sustainable communities and social justice
Togo Africa: Foundation Secour Universel
Mama Charity
Concurrent Projects:
Mama Charity has many irons in the fire so to speak with several projects integrating into an overall theme of caring for and educating children to make their world and our world a better place. She founded Fondation Secours Universel (FSU) also known as Orphelinat Mother Charity in 2003 located in Lomé, the capital of Togo. She continues today to create one big family of children, currently raising 168 children in Lomé where the orphanage is now stretched to its’ limits and yet newborn infants continue to be abandoned and brought to her doorstep by the local authorities.
Hand-in-Hand helped her purchase 3 acres of farmland 80 km north of Lomé where she grows crops that can be used as food sources for the orphanage. In addition she has use of property owned by a relative for growing trees and crops and now has a third parcel of land 100 km west of Lomé where she intends to eventually move the orphanage and create a complete village for the children.
There is a school that has been integrated into the orphanage in Lomé and Mama Charity with some assistance from Hand-in-Hand built a school just across the border from Lomé in Ghana. Many families cannot afford to live in Lomé and moved into Ghana. However there language is still French as in Togo and Mama Charity saw an opportunity to build a school to educate these children in their familiar language (Ghana’s official language is English). Because of widespread poverty in the village, supporting the school has been a challenge as parents often are unable to pay the full tuition. Hand-in-Hand has helped support the payment of teacher’s salaries while Mama Charity looks for other sources of funds. The government does not support the school.
If you would like to contribute to the educational fund, click here:
Tove
Tove, the land 100 km west of Lomé is now being developed. It is owned by a relative of Mama Charity’s and they are excited to support her foundation and her vision. A local organization offered to drill a borehole for water and is willing to purchase and install a solar generated water pump. With a good source of water, Mama Charity is planting trees, and crops and will be able to do so year round. The most pressing current need is money to build two dormitories, one for boys and one for girls and 2 classrooms. Mama Charity would like to move 50 children in grades, 3, 4, 5, and 6 to the Tove property to start school mid September 2024. The papaya and other fruit trees and the crops raised will serve as food sources for the children and their two teachers, 2 cooks, 2 farm laborers and 1 security person.
Maasai Mara-Kenya-Mama Dinah
Mama Dinah lives in a Maasai Mara village in southwestern Kenya not too far from the Tanzania border. The community has lived without fresh water to drink for many years. Fundraising globally, including a big fundraising campaign in Germany by relatives of Mama Dinah, plus fundraising by Hand-in-Hand has allowed Mama Dinah to have a borehole drilled. Work began on October 7, 2022 and drilling went to a depth of 350 meters and was completed on October 10, 2022. The borehole was capped until May 2023 when enough funds were raised to complete the solar powered pump , the two storage tanks and their structures and a simple distribution system. The water currently is piped from the borehole to the school, a short distance away. Some in the community still need to travel a couple of km to the school to carry water back to their homes. So now instead of carrying silted water from a dug out collection pond, they carry fresh drinking water, however water is carried in containers on their backs and is heavy work. We hope in this next year to supply funds to distribute water in 3 directions to bring it closer to the homes clustered in the community.
The community has set up a committee that oversees the borehole and tanks and solar pump. Each community member, men and women, contribute monthly shillings to create a fund for future repairs and needs for maintenance..
Since this is still the first full year since the complete project in operational, the community is looking into what entrepreneurial endeavors they can take to earn income from the new possibilities. Some fruit trees have been planted as a pilot project. Vegetable crops are being raised.
The community looked into fish farming and decided this was not a profitable business for them.
Mama Dinah and Maasai women in the community playfully celebrating their jewelry making and the jewelry they have for sale. They wish to find a broader market for sales.
Western Kenya-Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC)
Children's House and Feed Program
The OVC project (Orphans and Vulnerable Children) was begun by Sister Agnes in Kakamega Kenya on the Western Border with Uganda. It began when Sister Agnes became aware of the number of children in the community without enough food making them vulnerable to coercive kidnapping and being brought across the border to Uganda and trained as soldiers and sex slaves. Sr Agnes started a feeding and homing project. This has grown into providing some funds for educating the children, sometimes paying for uniforms or school supplies, making it possible for the children to have beds, food and schooling.
Sister Agnes’s vision was to start a poultry farm and be able to sell eggs and broilers for income. The initial venture into this did not work out well and the operation changed location and focus somewhat. Chicks are still being purchased and raised and eggs are being laid. Most eggs are being used as a food source and some are being hatched to grow the flock. During this time, Sister Agnes was given a male and female pig and started raising pigs. This was relatively lucrative raising money for children’s education at little expense. When the pigs needed to be moved to a new location, it has been more of a struggle as the location is no longer near residential schools where food scraps can be used to feed the pigs. At this time, the project is looking at all possibilities regarding the future of the pigs and the chickens. One aspect of the original plans was to be able to supply older children with a couple of pigs and mentor them on raising pigs for a livelihood. The same plan exists for the chickens
Sister Pamela joined the project a couple of years ago. Her specialty is educating older students to become nurses or operating theater workers. She has been overseeing the OVC project while Sister Agnes has been away on sabbatical. As we move forward with the OVC project we will be looking at possibly giving pigs to some students and mentoring them in the raising of them and the same with some of the chickens. We are also exploring establishing a loan program for girls who wish to get trained as nurses to help support their education and then have the graduated nurse repay the loan so it can be used to support another student.
Hand-in-Hand has supported the poultry project, purchase of a vehicle, providing some feed for pigs and chickens and solar panel installation for lighting for security of the animals.
