Did you know

In Kayamandi, when we started our programme in 2006, 2 out of 4 primary school children suffered from malnutrition, which can severely affect a child’s mental and physical development.

Most children in Kayamandi are affected by vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and are therefore more subject to infection, birth defects, and impaired physical and psycho-intellectual development.

Healthy children learn better. Better nutrition means stronger immune systems, less illness and better health. Healthy people are stronger, more productive and more able to create opportunities to gradually break the cycles of both poverty and hunger in a sustainable way.

Better nutrition is a prime entry point to ending poverty and a milestone to achieving a better quality of life.

In addition, research has shown that having a bad diet is now a better predictor of future violence, than past violent behaviour. Crime is a major problem in this community.

But this is just one side of the problem. Obesity is increasing alarmingly. Diet-related chronic diseases related to under- and over-nutrition problems account for more than half the world’s diseases.

Our programme has shown a dramatic improvement in this situation over the past five years, and with the help of our donors, we hope to maintain the current situation where malnutrition and underweight is within world health organisation standards of normality.