Aid for Africa

Friends of Africa International

omnistudio — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 19:26:11 +0000

For more than 20 years, Friends of Africa International has supported effective and established charitable organizations, research centers, and projects in Africa that focus on the conservation and protection of African wildlife and its habitat. Through education, financial aid, and volunteer coordination, we strive to put a spotlight on needs and support solutions to help eliminate them.

Friends of Africa International supports and partners with grassroots African organizations such as Save the Elephants, the Mount Kenya Trust, and the African Conservation Foundation. Kenya’s Save the Elephants works to secure the future for elephants and sustain the beauty and ecology integrity of where they live. The African Conservation Foundation works to protect and conserve Africa’s endangered wildlife and their habitats, including the sea turtles and the Nigerian-Cameroon chimpanzees. Activities range from delivering Elephant radio collars for research, supporting anti-poaching programs, purchasing grain for a remote village during a drought, to providing barbed wire fencing to a school garden project.

In the United States, Friends of Africa organizes seminars, lectures, and other events in for its partners, as well as Africa-centered cultural and educational initiatives. Friends of Africa also supports humanitarian projects in Africa, ranging from providing medical supplies and refurbishing schools.

Working to Save Africa’s Rich Biodiversity

laramony — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 16:59:06 +0000

The United Nations has named 2010 International Biodiversity Year, acknowledging the continued loss of plant and animal species around the world from population growth, urbanization, deteriorating habitats, invasive species, and more. Last year, the U.N. reported that 17,000 animal and plant species are at risk of extinction and some 60 percent of our planet’s ecosystems are no longer able to provide the food, clean water, and other benefits that they had in the past. Many of these species and ecosystems are found in Sub Saharan Africa, where millions of families depend on farming and home gardens for food and income. Wildlife and plant species rely on healthy ecosystems that are severely damaged.

Many Aid for Africa members are working to preserve the continent’s biodiversity. Ecoagriculture Partners works with community groups and farmers to manage farmland in ways that benefit biodiversity such as native plants and animals as well as food production. The International Livestock Research Institute is looking for ways to protect drought-tolerant Ankole cattle found in east and central Africa—a species known for rich milk and meat—which is on the brink of extinction. At current rates of decline, the Ankole is expected to disappear in 50 years.

Veterinarians with the Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project have been working for more than two decades to care for the endangered mountain gorilla through one of the world’s first programs to care for endangered species in their own habitat. These and other members work with their African partners to build biodiversity conservation into their programs. This work is critically important and needs support. Scientists believe there is still time and opportunity for biodiversity conservation in Africa during
2010–International Biodiversity Year–and beyond.

The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship

omnistudio — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:28:49 +0000

The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship translates idealism into action, supporting Schweitzer Fellows from the nation’s top health and human service schools annually as they develop and implement service projects with a direct — and lasting –impact on the health of underserved communities.

The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship (ASF) was founded to support the Nobel Peace Laureate Albert Schweitzer and his hospital in Lambaréné, Gabon, West Africa. The Schweitzer Hospital– a world leader in the fight against malaria, the leading killer of African children–serves as the primary source of health care for the surrounding region. ASF sponsors senior U.S. medical students as Schweitzer Fellows in medicine and pediatrics at the hospital. In nearly three decades, more than 100 Fellows provided medical care to Gabonese men, women, and children. Working with an international staff of Gabonese and other professionals, Fellows provide care each year through more than 35,000 outpatient visits and more than 6,000 hospitalizations for patients from all parts of Gabon. ASF supports the hospital’s Medical Research Unit, which focuses on malaria and is one of the most respected and productive research facilities in Africa. It also helped establish the Community Health Program, which is a national model for providing comprehensive village-based healthcare, vaccinations, and health education in rural areas.

Financial Times: Patrick Awuah’s Ashesi University Sets High Standards to Mold Africa’s Future Leaders

laramony — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:47:36 +0000

Thursday, January 28, 2010: Some say that the most powerful way to change the world is to educate its future leaders. This is certainly the view of Patrick Awuah, founder and president of Ghana’s Ashesi University. Read More

PBS Turns a Much-Needed Spotlight on Maternal Health Risks in the Wake of the Haiti Earthquake

laramony — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 18:20:00 +0000

It isn’t surprising that a team from the PBS newsmagazine NOW turned to Ann Starrs, president and cofounder of Family Care International, when it wanted to better understand why women in Haiti have the highest rate of death in childbirth in the Western Hemisphere and what some 63,000 pregnant Haitian women now face in the aftermath of the earthquake. For more than two decades, Aid-for-Africa-member Family Care International has been working in Africa and Latin America to make pregnancy and childbirth safer for women and girls. There are not many nonprofit organizations around the world that place maternal health at the center of their mission. Family Care International was one of the first and remains one of the few.

Having a child in Sub Saharan Africa is risky business. According to UNICEF, 1 in 16 women in the region die during pregnancy or in childbirth. In Haiti, before the earthquake, the rate was 1 in 44 women. In the United States it is 1 in 4,800 women. Family Care International works on the ground with local groups to focus attention on maternal deaths, forge consensus around proven strategies, accelerate action, and save women’s lives. It is encouraging that the PBS Emmy-winning show has chosen to focus on this issue in the context of Haiti’s crisis. We hope that spotlight draws broader attention to this crisis in African countries such as Kenya, Mali and Burkina Faso, as well.

Alternatives to Orphanages Bring Hope to Africa’s Vulnerable Children

laramony — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 00:22:05 +0000

The United Nations estimates that more than 55 million African children have lost one parent and that almost 15 million of them have lost a parent to AIDS. Orphanages are often seen as a solution for these orphaned and vulnerable children. In a recent article in the New York Times, Celia Dugger suggests an alternative. Most often these children end up living with extended family members, many who are struggling to care for their own children. Pilot efforts underway in Malawi to support families that are caring for orphans have potential. Another approach not mentioned by Dugger shows promise in South Africa. A British and U.S. charity, African Solutions to African Problems, supports local women’s organizations that run community day-care centers for orphaned and vulnerable children. Children arrive at the centers each morning, and local women running the centers ensure that they receive nutritious food, healthcare, schooling, and psychological support. The women receive training in gardening, child care, and management–whatever it takes. The result: healthy and happy children and sustainable community institutions run by local women–a win-win. In some of the poorest rural areas of South Africa today, some 600 women care for 9,000 children in these centers, and the number is growing.

For Aid for Africa Members, Every Day is World AIDS Day

laramony — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 19:10:26 +0000

Two-thirds of the people in the world living with HIV and AIDS are in Sub Saharan Africa. In its 2009 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic, UNAIDS found that more than 22 million people in the region have HIV/AIDS. In 2008, 1.4 million people in the region died of AIDS and almost 2 million became infected with HIV. Compounding the high rates of disease in many areas are inadequate health care systems–poor countries have few health centers, hospitals or health care workers, and so struggle to provide critical care and treatment.

The numbers can be overwhelming, and yet valuable progress is being made in increasing access to HIV and AIDS services. The theme of this, the 21st World AIDS Day, is Universal Access and Human Rights. While most Aid for Africa charities confront the realities of HIV/AIDS everyday as they work with their African partners throughout the continent, we would like to call attention to a few that are even more specifically focused on increasing access to services, providing effective treatment options and preserving human dignity, a vital component of combating the spread of the epidemic.

Health Alliance International works in partnership with ministries of health to build their health systems, including HIV/AIDS testing and treatment projects in Mozambique, where antiretroviral therapy has increased from just 4,000 in 2004 to 80,000 today. African Solutions to African Problems supports community-based programs and women’s networks to help them better deliver life-affirming care for orphans and vulnerable children affected by HIV/AIDS in South Africa. Partners in Health has proved that AIDS can be treated in a poverty setting through its effective model of community-based care now being used in Rwanda, Lesotho, and Malawi. African Child Care Association provides HIV/AIDS prevention training to teens in Cameroon. Mothers2mothers is helping some 50,000 women a month prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS throughout Africa. AID Village Clinics helps educate, prevent, and treat the Maasai of western Kenya affected by HIV/AIDS. Firelight Foundation supports and advocates for children orphaned or affected by HIV/AIDS. Children of Uganda cares for AIDS orphans and other disadvantaged children in Uganda with the goal of helping them become healthy and productive members of society. South Africa Partners creates partnerships between organizations in the United States and South Africa for HIV/AIDS support groups. Foundation for Hospices in Sub Saharan Africa supports African organizations that provide home-based hospice and palliative care to those who are dying of HIV/AIDS. World Hope International provides HIV/AIDS prevention and orphan care.

On World AIDS day, we applaud all who are supporting efforts to prevent the spread of HIV and treat and care for those living with HIV and AIDS.

Surviving Drought through Small Businesses

laramony — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:34:28 +0000

According to Reuters some 23 million people are in need of food aid in East Africa because of severe drought. Last month the Ethiopian Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development asked the international community for aid to feed 6.2 million people affected by the drought. In Kenya, hundreds of thousands of cattle and goats have died and wildlife is beginning to perish. The effects of the drought are also being felt in Somalia and parts of Tanzania. Drought is not unknown to the region, but experts suggest that droughts are occurring more frequently—every two to three years instead of every ten years, as was the pattern in the past. But drought does not have to mean disaster. The Boma Fund, an Aid for Africa member working in Northern Kenya, an area severely affected by the drought, finds that the small businesses supported by Boma Fund grants are providing a buffer. Boma Director Kathleen Colson reports that although the drought has killed 90 percent of the goats and cows in the region, the owners of the business start ups have been able to buy food at wholesale prices and, for the first time, basic staples such as tea, rice, and ground corn are available in the villages at affordable prices. She also reports that even with the demise of the livestock industry—the main source of income in the local economy—money coming into the area from individuals living on pensions or from those who work in industries unaffected by the drought are helping to sustain the new businesses. Droughts will continue to occur throughout Africa and the world. But survival depends on people having the means to purchase the food they need. Sustaining small businesses in rural areas seems to be one way to do that.

CNN Story on Aid for Africa Member Solar Light for Africa

omnistudio — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:29:42 +0000

Thursday, November 5, 2009: Lights for East Africa – A family-run charity is making life a little bit brighter in Eastern Africa. CNN’s T.J. Holmes reports.

The Nobel Economics Prize and Africa

omnistudio — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 17:52:56 +0000

Tapping Elinor Ostrom as one of the winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics is exciting for anyone interested in issues of saving forests, wildlife conservation, agricultural development, and environmental protection—all of critical importance in Africa. Aid for Africa members bring to life the ideas and principles Ostrom identified about how people come together to manage their common lands, resources, and futures. This approach doesn’t focus only on the economic theory of getting prices right or market demands, but instead looks at how societies create institutional arrangements that best work for them to manage natural resources. This approach is more apt to include community-based actions on the ground and thus involve understanding of traditional systems, customs, and needs. As communities throughout Sub Saharan Africa work to manage watersheds that provide irrigation for their farms or determine where to graze cattle while protecting wildlife habitat, for instance, they are more likely to create sustainable economic futures when they work toward common goals of all the key players. We see it everyday in our work in Africa. In Uganda and Kenya, Aid for Africa member Ecoagriculture Partners is working with farmers and communities to manage their lands in ways that provide food, protect the natural order, and expand livelihoods. Green Belt Movement International, which was started by Nobel Peace Laureate Wangari Maathi, began as a grassroots tree-planting program in which women were empowered to restore critical forests and watersheds while improving their livelihoods. Forest Trends helps rural communities come together with private and public interests to find ways to manage forests products. And African Rainforest Conservancy is funding work that ensures that communities surrounding coastal and mountain rainforests in Tanzania protect critical habitat while developing eco-friendly businesses.