Providing our girls with healthy, wholesome and homegrown food is at the heart of the care and wellbeing programme at Baale Mane, and ensures that each girl has every opportunity to grow up into a strong and capable young woman by the time they graduate from our programme. 

Malnourishment is widespread across India, and is a gendered issue, with UNICEF estimating that 36 percent of Indian women are chronically under-nourished from childhood.  The impact of this is enormous, affecting maternal and child health and limiting girls and womens’ opportunities from a young age due to sickness. At Baale Mane, when the girls first come to us, they are often under-nourished and not used to regular meal-times; within one year of our intervention, the girls are visibly healthier, stronger and often grow at least one foot in height!  

We provide our girls with three healthy, home-cooked meals a day, an after-school snack and a glass of milk in the morning. We give the girls an egg a day, meat once a week and fish twice a week as well as a piece of fruit after each meal. They oversee their own menu, and the older girls often help in the kitchen, developing their cooking skills whilst helping to take care of the younger girls in the process. We grow local vegetables such as the moringa (drumstick), a super-food, spinach, tomatoes, bhindi (lady-fingers) as well as mangoes, papaya and bananas in our organic kitchen garden.  

Our annual food budget is £11,500. £230 feeds one girl for a year, £315 feeds all girls for a week and £1260 for one month. 

By donating to our campaign, you are helping us to ensure that our girls have the best possible opportunity to grow up to be healthy, strong young women capable of becoming leaders in their communities and of living independent and fulfilling lives.  

This Christmas, we are also launching Oota, a project sharing recipes from Baale Mane – keep an eye out for our new website or follow us on Instagram!