Nutrition, Education, Healthcare, HOPE
In Malawi, we are working in partnership with some of the world’s poorest communities to provide:
- Care for orphaned and vulnerable children
- Shelter, nutrition, sanitation, and clean water
- Education and vocational training
- Awareness-raising education into the country’s biggest killers, HIV/Aids and Cholera
We work within ultra poor, remote, rural communities in Nsanje; Tengani and Mbenje, Lilongwe; Chitukula, Kabudula and Mtema, Chitipa; Mwabulambia, Mangochi.
Feeding Programme
Early years education is a rarity in large swathes of rural Malawi. The brutal economics of survival mean many children are working in the tobacco fields from the age of five, not starting school until they are 10. By this age, it is too late, and their prospects are bleak.
With the support of the Ministries of Education, and Health, as well as the local communities themselves, JCT is changing this, in large part thanks to its feeding programme. The promise of a nutritional meal of soya porridge every day is enough to create an appetite for learning.
Early Childhood Development Centres are offering children, from the age of two, a solid foundation from which to move on to primary school. Once enrolled, thanks to the feeding programme, there is zero absenteeism.
Children who have benefitted from the ECD programme go on to perform well at primary school, producing young people who are able to read, write, and speak English, crucial in giving them positive options for a brighter, self-sustaining future. 90% of JCT students who go on to secondary school graduate with good grades. It is our hope that they go on to become positive, progressive leaders of their communities, even their nation.
All this is possible from the simple gift of soya flour, salt, and sugar.
HIV/Aids Awareness & Education
It is estimated that over 1-million people in Malawi are living with HIV/Aids, 57,000 of whom are children under the age of 14. It has devastated families and whole communities, leaving hundreds of thousands of children orphaned or vulnerable.
The good news is that from a high of 130,000 people a year, in 1995, new infections have dropped to around 16,000 a year, as of 2022. This is due to the awareness and education work not only at government level, but also at a local level through NGOs, like JCT.
Treatment for people diagnosed with HIV/Aids has improved significantly since JCT was established. And, in collaboration with charities, like ActionAid International and local healthcare organisations, the foundation is helping those with the virus, in the remote, rural communities it supports, to live longer, healthier lives.
Community Based Childhood Development Centres
Alongside its orphanages – that provide basic shelter and care for the orphaned and vulnerable children in the communities it supports – JCT is also invested in the education and psychological wellbeing of the children in its care.
Early Childhood Development Centres, as well as Vocational Training Centres for young people, are central to facilitating this. These centres are also open to the children of the wider community and are run by a mix of JCT staff, government-funded teachers, and local community volunteers.
Built by local volunteers from bricks they have made themselves – using tools and additional building materials supplied by JCT – these are genuine community hubs that improve the prospects of all the children and young people who live locally.
Self-sustainability
Everything JCT does is geared towards helping communities help themselves. From irrigation schemes and the provision of seeds and tools to education and the loan of livestock for breeding, JCT works closely with local chiefs, village committees, and local government agencies to help communities become self-sustainable.
Any surplus from these schemes is used to support the foundation’s feeding programmes for orphaned and vulnerable children in the care of the nearest Childhood Development Centre.
Clean water and sanitation
Water-borne diseases, like Cholera and diarrhoea – the second leading cause of death among children under five, worldwide – are rife in countries like Malawi, where water is often drawn from unprotected, shallow wells.
Alongside providing better nutrition through its feeding programmes, JCT is committed to providing clean water and better sanitation to enhance the life chances of the communities it supports. The boreholes and sanitation systems are constructed by the communities themselves, JCT providing the funds for pumping equipment and tools. Eco San toilets not only offer better sanitation, they also provide free, natural fertilizer to help frow crops.
Relatively cheap and simple to create, boreholes are life-changing for these remote, rural communities. Alongside each infrastructure project, JCT also runs programmes to educate communities on good sanitation.