Duo Global Consulting are proud to be supporting a local community project in South Africa, called Ebenezer. In March of this year, our MD Laura, visited South Africa and was so touched by the local people and the dire needs of this community, immediately pledged the support of Duo. As part of our continued work with the charity, this Christmas we are running the Ebenezer Christmas Wishing Tree.

The Ebenezer Project was set up by Alyson & Linda Zikalala, a local Zulu paster and English school teacher. Having worked closely with the people in the community, they recognised a real need for support for the families, and in particular, the local children, for whom, with poor levels of education, rising levels of disease and a severe shortage of food, the future looked very bleak.

In South Africa 51% of children live below the poverty line and 13.8 million people live in extreme poverty where even access to daily food is a struggle. Two years ago, the Ebenezer project started to build their own community centre with the aim of helping families in the area to fulfil their basic needs of clothing, food and shelter. Recently, in addition to a feeding scheme, the project also started a homework club - getting a good education for these children is their only chance to break the poverty cycle and move into a better standard of living. Already, they are seeing a visible difference - the children show promise in their developments, are gaining weight, and disease in the community is getting better. The long-term vision of the Ebenezer project is to help the local people become self-sustainable and see the community transformed into a place where their families can thrive.

When we asked the children in the local community what they would like for Christmas, they sent us their Christmas wishes. Their wishes show exactly the situation they are living in, with needs that we so often take for granted in here the UK. Children in the community often only have one set of shared clothes between the family, so can't go out together with their siblings; local girls in the community routinely miss a week of school per month due to not having the proper sanitary supplies, whilst other children walk miles a day to school, often in shoes that are in bad repair. Other basic needs include school uniforms, exercise books, pencils, lunch boxes and toiletries.

We hope you will join us in granting some Christmas wishes. Any general donations would be really appreciated, or, if you would like to donate specific items for a child, or children, in the community, please see a list below and just make a note with your donation.

All of the below gifts are priced per child:

Stationary Kit £10 - Exam Supplies £10 - Girls Sanitary Pack £15 - Children's Shoes £15 - Mathematics Kit £20 - School Bag & Supplies £20 - School Uniform £20 - 1 day's food at the centre for the local families £30 -

Since this is a local charity, 100% of all donations go to the children and their families. The project is always looking for additional partners, to help their long term vision come to life, if you are interested in learning how to get more involved with the Ebenezer Project, or would like to make a private donation, please get in touch with Duo's Managing Director Laura by emailing laura@duoglobalconsulting.com

Thank you so much for helping support this project. Your donations are really appreciated. Merry Christmas from the Duo Team!