Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

 

I originally created this page to use a significant birthday as an opportunity for raising money for IDE-UK. The birthday has now gone, but the enthusiasm with which people donated has encouraged me to keep the page open. 

 

Since I became more or less retired about a year ago I have become heavily, and practically, involved with IDE-UK, a development charity whose objective is to supply the world's poorest, typically living on less than two dollars a day - "the bottom two billion" - with tools and technologies to enable them to permanently increase their incomes. (See www.ide-uk.org ). 

IDE's approach ticked a lot of boxes for me in deciding where to channel my voluntary efforts: they develop cheap solutions which are widely applicable, they always measure the impact of their work and they ensure that the change they enable is self-sustaining when their involvement ends.

IDE's main focus is on productive water: wells, pumps, water storage and micro-irrigation, usually to make possible the production of value-added crops in the dry season.  It also organises the local manufacture of its pumps and irrigation equipment, trains well drillers, encourages supply chains for seeds and fertilisers and helps farmers to form cooperatives to sell their extra produce - a total supply chain approach. IDE has development projects involving poor farmers in 13 countries: Africa (5), Asia (6) and Central America (2).

Last November I spent two weeks, with Kath, visiting agricultural and honey-producing IDE projects in Ethiopia - as part of my involvement I am looking at the feasibility of exporting Ethiopian honey to the UK. The photos on the left are from that visit. What an experience!  We how have much deeper insights into the nature of extreme poverty, and what might be done about it, and my enthusiasm is redoubled.

Please give as much as you can to IDE-UK.  Your money will help to develop new and cheaper technologies and will enable more poor farmers to increase their incomes and improve life chances for their families.

 

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.