Most people in the world who are living in poverty and malnourished, live in developing countries (mostly in Africa, Asia and Central/South America). Of course we all want to help, but what are the best ways?
Obviously something is not working, because there are around 800 million people who don’t have enough food, despite the western world throwing away more than enough food to feed every hungry person on earth. And some of the world’s richest people having enough money in their bank accounts to feed everyone on earth.
We do know that nearly all countries with famines are in areas of conflict (wars always end up with people in starvation). So obviously creating world peace is the best preventive method.
But there are far better ways to help people in developing countries, without just throwing money at huge charities, which spend thousands of pounds on upsetting TV ads, rather than spending your donations directly on those who need help.
Obviously the issues cannot be solved, unless honest questions are asked, about why so many countries don’t have enough food to eat, or water to drink. Climate change is making things worse. But a huge issue is desertification, often caused by ‘sending animal gifts’ and giving to charities that focus on ‘giving food’, rather than empowering local people to grow and eat their own food.
Major western companies encourage us to ‘donate’ things like electronics (which cause pollution and fire hazards) or even plastic tampons and sanitary towels to ‘keep girls in school’. When in fact, there are companies in Africa creating good jobs, by making reusable feminine care using a blend of recycled paper and biodegradable papyrus leaves.
And of course, the other big issues are what we buy (from tea and coffee to clothing – often made in developing countries) and how we bank and vote, to create the kind of world that we wish to live in.
Some politicians often talk of the need for population control in developing countries. In fact, a western child has a carbon footprint about 11 times that of a child in Nigeria. It’s not always how many children, but how each child lives.
Pay a Little Extra (for fairly-made goods)
Whether you are buying food, coffee, clothing or vegan shoes, always read up on who made them, and how the workers are treated and paid. This organic t-shirt is from Yes Friends (Bristol).
This company knows that nobody is going to pay £80 for an organic t-shirt, so it works direct with producers (not selling in the high street) then buys in bulk, to pass cost savings on.
Like Fair Trade for food and drink, look for Fair Wear logos on clothes (more stringent than Better Cotton that still allows pesticides and Ethical Trading Initiative, which ‘pays wages that comply with local laws in developing countries, which does not sound too promising).
Since the tragic fire in a Bangladeshi clothing factory (where over 1000 garment workers died), big chain stores have been getting better, but not fast enough. If your cotton t-shirt costs £1, something has gone seriously wrong.
Fair Wear’s 8 Code of Labour Practices are:
- Employment is freely chosen
- The right to collective bargaining
- No employment discrimination
- No exploitation or child labour
- Payment of a living wage
- Reasonable hours of work
- Safe and healthy working conditions
- Legally binding employment relationship
Good on You is a good website, where you can type in the name of your favourite clothing brand, and it brings up rating for human rights (how and where it was made) along with animal welfare and environmental ratings.
If laundering synthetic materials, use a microplastic catcher.
By far, M & S comes out top for the high street. But what is surprising is that despite bargain brands like Primark not faring well, the more expensive brands (like Next) don’t far much better.
Buy Toilet Paper (that supports sanitation projects)
Around 2.3 million people on earth don’t have safe flushing toilets, and another 2 million have no access to safe sanitation. Around 200 people die every hour through diseases like diarrhoea, simply because they have no access to a safe loo.
Children have to walk to the local woods or rivers, which can put their safety and health at risk, and reduce dignity (and the hours spent in school).
Cholera and dysentery (which combined with diarrhoea kill over 2000 children daily – more than measles, malaria and AIDS combined) can cause stunting in children, and along with pneumonia, is the second leading cause of death in children under five, in developing countries. Hundreds of children are also infected with parasitic worms, from going to the toilet in soil.
Who Gives a Crap? (the company’s Aussie, hence the cheeky name) offers affordable 400-sheet rolls of thick recycled paper or bamboo toilet tissue, sent in paper packaging.
Use code FRIENDSOFWGAC for 20% off toilet paper subscription (valid for new subscribers, cannot be used with other discount codes).
50% of profits are donated to organisations like Fresh Life that is bringing clean safe sanitation to communities worldwide.
Don’t ‘Gift Animals’ to Developing Countries
Big charities ask us to ‘send farm animals’ to provide milk, but 75% of people with African and Asian heritage are lactose-intolerant. This is not a good idea, as it’s another mouth to feed and water, and leads to fertile land being over-grazed, when it could be used to grow high-protein drought-tolerant crops like teff.
In Ethiopia, over 40% of people are starving. Yet the country has 50 million cattle, sheep and goats and 35 milllion chickens – all consuming food, land and water. This causes overgrazing, deforestation, erosion and desertification.
You can feed more people per acre with plants. Yet during Live Aid, England was importing grain from Ethiopia to feed livestock, when that land could have been used to grow food for local people.
It takes 100 times more land to produce 1 gram of protein from cattle or sheep (compared to peas).
The charity A Well Fed World provides plant-based meals, give grants for microbusinesses, funds the planting of fruit and nut trees, and distributes low-cost seeds for community gardens. It also offers food relief during hurricanes, earthquakes, floods and wildfires (Food for Life runs similar programs). Better than spending thousands of pounds on TV ads, surely?
Support Clean Safe Water Projects
Despite water being (along with air) one of our essentials, millions of people worldwide lack access to clean safe water, and 3 million people die each year from waterborne diseases (most are children under 5 years old).
Not drinking enough water also contributes to many health problems, along with reducing ability to study and attend school. Many children and adults also have to spend up to 4 hours each day, collecting water from wells that are miles away, instead of attending school or work.
Although we are all told to drink filtered tap water, sometimes we’re caught short and opt for bottled. Whether still or sparkling, One Water (sold in Co-op in glass bottles and tin cans) uses profits to support clean water projects.
Never give sparkling water to pets, it could cause bloat.
The glass bottles are made from a third recycled glass, and easy to recycle at end of use. The cans are made from over 50% recycled aluminium, and again are easy to recycle. Just rinse and squash it, pop it in your recycling bin, and in 60 days it will become another can.
It’s likely that collectively, millions of people pop into Co-op supermarkets each day, to buy a can or bottle of water. So why not switch to this brand? You still drink your water just the same, generate no plastic waste, and help to fund clean water in developing countries.
In 2003 (on the same day that Saddam Hussain was found hiding in a bunker) the founder of One Water had just returned from 2 years travelling around the world (which included a spate without safe clean water thanks to Hurricane Mitch in Honduras).
He opened the newspaper to find a photograph of a young girl in Nairobi. She was sitting next to a tap – that was padlocked. So far his foundation has raised over £30 million, helping to bring clean safe water to over 5 million people.
Monies raised from buying One Water mostly focus on work in 4 countries:
- Ghana
- Malawi
- Kenya
- Rwanda
Most money is concentrated on building large-scale clean water systems in urban areas, with other funds helping rural communities and humanitarian emergencies. Projects helped so far include a whole village receiving clean safe water in Malawi (where almost half the country has no access to clean water and 25% of people have no access to clean toilets).
Support Climate-Smart Agriculture
It’s believed that around one in every 11 people go to bed hungry each night worldwide, that’s around a third of the entire population on earth.
In 2024, the hungriest countries on earth are: Haiti, Mali, Sudan, South Sudan and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
Yet there is more than enough food for every person on earth. In fact, more food is thrown away than is needed to feed every hungry person.
Climate smart agriculture teaches people how to grow food in their own climates, to produce more. For example, one woman who used to grow one bag of maize now grows eight, using the same crops.
It’s a bit like our ‘rewilding’ and making the soil better, for rich harvests without much human interference. Kind of like African versions of food forests. Solutions include drought-tolerant seeds and agroforestry.
Many Africans are fed up of this ‘begging bowl’ image’, to try to get people to donate ‘just £3 a month’. The idea is that you will use a will-writing service to leave a legacy to big charities. Far better to donate to small charities and make your own Will.
Recently Elon Musk was shown a proposal by the UN on how $6 billion could save 42 million people in 43 countries from starving to death. Musk said that if this plan was proven, he would sell his Tesla shares and do it right away.
But World Food Programme explained that you can’t ‘solve world hunger’ by throwing money at it. But such an amount could save 42 million people on the brink of not being able to live.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos recently spent $5.5 billion going into space (for 4 minutes). He said it was his ‘best day ever’. Global Citizen reports that the money could have instead saved 37.5 million people from starvation.
Or fully funded the International Fund for Agricultural Development that would empower young people and women to grow their own food, and adapt to climate change. Its current shortfall, is what Bezos spent in the first 30 seconds of his super-short space trip.
Help Fund Solar Lights (to replace kerosene)
Most people in Africa either chop wood (causing deforestation) or use expensive kerosene (flammable and toxic) to light homes and read/study. But obviously solar power is the obvious choice on this hot continent.
When time comes to replace, two companies not only make great eco products, but use profits to help fund solar lights to give to adults and children in developing countries.
This lightweight solar lamp is a cheerful way to introduce young people to the wonders of solar power. Use at home, or in the garden or while camping.
It’s important to turn off lights when not needed to avoid light pollution, and to help prevent birds flying into windows.
Designed by artist Olafur Eliasson, the lamp offers 50 hours of light (dimmest setting) or 4 hours of light (brightest setting) after 5 hours of charging, and also features a dimmer.
It has a battery lifespan of five years, when used daily. Extremely robust and durable, it is certified for quality and consistency, and includes a lanyard and story book in a beautiful box.
To charge, just place the Little Sun lamp in the sun, with its solar panel facing up. Press once for bright light, and twice to turn it off. Hold the button down, to activate the dimmer function.
Power a Life makes powerful phone chargers to fit in your pocket. Ideal for a gift with optional engraving, it’s sold alongside the Wee Pal Power Bank (the case is made from 2 recycled plastic water bottles).
Invest Savings to give Microloans
Shared Interest is a great place, to consider investing your pennies. Savings are pooled and then given out as fair trade loans to individuals in developing countries, to empower themselves to do what they love, for a living.
Their main investment focus is on two products, both consumed hugely in western countries: coffee (over 2 billion cups consumed worldwide daily) and cocoa (chocolate is eaten by 8 million people daily in the UK alone). Yet often people working both industries are not receiving fair working conditions or pay (some cocoa farmers get so little money, some have equated it to near ‘modern slavery’).
Anyone can open an account (including charities, schools and faith groups). Members then get ‘withdrawable shares’ that can’t be sold, and are invested in their projects, along with money of other members.
Once the crops are sold, the organisation repays Shared Interest the capital, plus interest. These funds are then recycled and lent out again. You can choose to keep or donate the interest received. Like any investment, there is a risk (the maximum investment is £100,000) but this is a good place to pool say £100 with others, if you fancy your extra cash doing some good.
Don’t Send Our Trash to Africa
Some have accused companies that send their waste to toxic rubbish dumps in Africa, of colonalism. Items are sent there due to landfill taxes in England and lax environmental regulations in Africa. People there are often so poor, they ignore health risks, in order to find and sell scrap metal, in order to eat. Watch e-Wasteland, a wonderful documentary on what happens to electronics, once they are sent to Africa.
People in The Philippines recently sent back tonnes of rubbish to Canada, which has now agreed to cover the full cost of disposal. The President even said he would ‘sail to Canada, and dump the garbage back there again’, if it got sent back to them.
Not just rubbish, but often unwanted clothing (made with synthetic fibres that never break down) or often shipped off to Africa, named ‘dead man’s white clothes’ by local people. Often it’s clothing that is not fit for purpose (overalls that are covered in paint stains).
Some western companies encourage us to ‘donate’ feminine care to girls in Africa, which are usually made wiht plastic (which again never breaks down) and sent to countries where poverty causes many to share such items (on a continent ravaaged by HIV and AIDS).
Yet locals already have a more sustainable and empowering solution, like making reusable pads with biodegradable materials like papyrus leaves. Afripads is a Ugandan social enterprise that employs local people to make the pads, which don’t pollute and are safe to use. The pads have collectively resulted in 20 million schooldays being ‘given back to girls’, and are sold in over 40 countries.
One thing it is okay to donate is quality working bicycles. These provide free and fast zero-emission transport, which helps people get to school and work. Remove dirt, grease and mud before donation (along with personal stickers). This makes it easier for organisations to assess the bikes, before sending on.
Boycott Companies that Market Formula
For years, there have been boycotts of the big formula companies, that market their products to new mothers in developing countries. This is done by offering ‘free formula’ (made with dairy – most people of African heritage are lactose-intolerant).
Then when the mothers return home, the formula is no longer free. But as their baby is now using formula rather than breast milk (even poor mothers usually can safely breastfeed), these desperate women sometimes water down the formula for cost (reducing the nutrition benefits) or mix it with dirty water (due to no other choice).
World Health Organisation estimates that 800,000 babies that die, could survive, if they were breast-fed, rather than given formula.
Watch Tigers, the story of how a former marketeer takes on his old employers, backed by a breastfeeding charity. When he learns that infant formula may be causing some babies to die, he immediately resigns and is now on a mission to stop the practice.
For babies in developing countries with cleft palate and other conditions that make breastfeeding difficult, medics have created Nifty Cup. This simple device lets babies ‘lap’ milk’ rathe than having to use formula, and costs just $1.
