Hi

I'm James and I'm a veterinary surgeon working with horses in the East of England.

I AM RAISING MONEY TO TRAVEL TO THE GAMBIA TO WORK WITH THE GAMBIA HORSE AND DONKEY TRUST. I WILL BE PROVIDING DESPERATELY-NEEDED VETERINARY TREATMENT TO WORKING HORSES AND DONKEYS AS WELL AS HELPING TO EDUCATE FARMERS IN HORSEMANSHIP.

We are very lucky in the UK in that the vast majority of our horses live happy, healthy lives with nothing more demanded of them than companionship and pleasure. Whilst this is not always the case, and I have sadly seen some cases of suffering in my job, I see many, many more cases of diseases caused by obesity and easy living!

This all could not be further from the case in the Gambia. A small country in west Africa, the Gambia suffers from severe poverty and hard-working horses and donkeys are vital to poor farmers desperately trying to scrape a living. Hard conditions, poverty, high levels of disease and no history of horsemanship in the Gambia means that many horses and donkeys lead hard, short lives plagued by injury and disease. Their poor farmer owners also suffer from this by losing the increased productivity a healthy working horse or donkey can offer.

The Gambia Horse and Donkey Trust is a charity that provides this desperately-needed veterinary treatment to working horses and donkeys. It also performs fantastic work educating the local people in how to better care for their animals. http://www.gambiahorseanddonkey.org.uk/

Thank you for reading and please help! No matter how big or small your donation, it will help me get one step closer to providing this much-needed help.