You are making a difference...

We are so thankful for your kind and generous support towards our work in the Philippines.

The money you gave will ensure we can support them throughout this year, no matter what it throws at us. With our charity shops closed due to the pandemic, your support is more important than ever.

Here are some stories from our Father's Refuge Project, which you will be a part of replicating throughout Badjao village because of your donations...

We built a housing block for families who have nowhere to live. When one of our rooms became available, one of the families that applied was a widow with four young children. They were living in a tiny storeroom of a little shop and needed help. We chose them for the available room, but just before they moved in, the mother sadly passed away.

Their young uncle took guardianship of the four orphans but had nowhere to stay. They now live in the available room in the housing block, and we have helped them with household items and have provided employment for the uncle. We also provide off-site daycare for the four children Monday to Thursday. What a privilege to bring smiles to children’s faces like this.

These four dear children above have another uncle. This is Marco who is 18 years old. We soon realised that his small stature was a result of stunting and delayed development caused by neglect and malnutrition as an infant. So it has been a delight to recruit him to our farm team where we are training him in organic vegetable growing.

It’s wonderful to see his self-esteem growing daily as he sees the fruit of his work feeding the team and children.

"Giving food in times of disaster helps short-term, but poverty alleviation that lasts is to empower the rural poor with skills to get good returns from their land." (Duncan, Project Partner)

There are many ways the team have been providing training for children and families and will continue to throughout 2021:

• Gardening - including composting, vertical planting (using any accessible item to grow vegetables in the village) and benefitting from the tomato plant given to each family. They have also begun mushroom farming
• ALS school (alternative learning system), providing education for those who have no access to school
• Hygiene and life skills training - including preventing the spread of COVID-19, and also providing parenting advice for young parents.

We look forward to seeing the developments throughout 2021 thanks to your generosity!