With a new year upon us, all of us at Bread and Water for Africa® want to take this opportunity to thank all of our supporters across the United States and around the world who are enabling us to fulfill our mission to help tens of thousands of children, mothers and fathers, the sick and elderly and others in sub-Saharan African countries desperately in need of help.
We also want to wish everyone a Happy New Year to everyone involved in the work Bread and Water for Africa®, especially our international spokesperson Phylis Keino, founder and director of the Lewa Children’s Home in Kenya and all our partners in twelve sub-Saharan countries.
In addition we want to recognize and express our gratitude to the following organizations: All Blessings Flow, the Catholic Medical Mission Board, Medical Assistance Program (MAP International and the University of Virginia Hospital Medical Inventory (MERCI) program for support of our healthcare program; the Jim Foote Foundation Inc. for support of a school Meal program in a Kenyan slum; the Landis Family Trust for support of education and health care programs in Kenya; Market Development Group for creative work in promoting Bread and Water for Africa® programs; ParaWest Management for its support of orphan care programs in Zambia; Missionary Expediters & Cargo Logistics; and to so very many individual donors, from school children collecting pennies to runners logging miles (and dollars) as they raced for proceeds directed to Bread and Water for Africa®.
Ane we would be remiss in not extending a special thank you to our dedicated board of directors, who oversee the operations of Bread and Water for Africa® and provide unwavering support for our mission to enhance the quality of life for thousands year after year.
Thanks to all these organizations and individuals, during 2024 we continued to advance our mission of reaching out to children and families throughout sub-Saharan Africa. In collaboration with a total of 21 grassroots community partners across a dozen African nations, we served more than 154,000 individuals through our orphan care, education, WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene), healthcare, agriculture/food self-sufficiency programs and more in 12 countries.
We have accomplished a lot in this past year. In Uganda, we take pride in redeveloping and relocating a banana plantation and the Kyasira Home of Hope orphanage, which was destroyed by flooding from nearby Lake Victoria.
This year, we faced significant challenges with the cholera outbreak in 14 countries, including Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The outbreak was particularly severe in the DRC and Ethiopia, classified as “acute crisis” in July 2024. Despite these challenges, we remained resilient and continued our mission to improve lives in sub-Saharan Africa.
Looking ahead, we aim to continue collaborating with our grassroots partners to support their journey towards self-sufficiency. This includes making capital investments in agriculture for our orphan care partners, enabling them to grow food for the children in their care while generating income for their operations. This focus is crucial as inflation remains a concern in sub-Saharan Africa, with an average rate of 18.1 percent, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as of October.
None of our achievements would be possible without the generous support of our donors and nonprofit partners in the U.S., who share our vision and mission to improve the lives of tens of thousands in sub-Saharan Africa.
