Giving Tuesday Changes Lives

Over the last three years, your Giving Tuesday response has impacted thousands of lives around the world!

Giving Tuesday is a day for radical generosity, and we’ve seen our donors show up and support the work of our partners year after year! Thank you for answering the call to “do good” each year on this special day.

Because of your compassion, children in Zimbabwe have received daily school meals, families in Yemen have survived seasons of conflict and hunger, and children with disabilities in Malawi have gained access to nourishing food and life-changing equipment.

Giving Tuesday 2022

Food For Kids in Zimbabwe

For fourteen years, we worked with a partner in Zimbabwe to feed 41,600 children across 86 schools a daily meal. For many students, this school meal was their only food for the day.

These school meals lifted a heavy burden off families — mothers and fathers knew their children had something to eat, and could use the money they’d previously spent on food to invest in their family’s future.

After incredible donations through multiple Giving Tuesday campaigns and our Christmas Gift Catalogue, we were able to pass this project into local hands! Thanks to an incredible funding partner, a new factory has been built in Tsholotsho, Zimbabwe, where the fortified breakfast cereal for these children is made. This new factory has reduced the cost of shipping the cereal from out of the country and will provide food to even more families for decades to come!

Thank you to everyone who gave to this project for Giving Tuesday! We invite you to read stories of the children and families transformed through Food for Kids.

Giving Tuesday 2023

Emergency Food for Yemen

In Yemen — a country that has been in active war for over ten years — we recognize that food means so much. Food is community. Food is peace. Food is health. Food is love. We’ve seen firsthand how food can be used to create transformation, aid peace-building and bring neighbours together.

In 2023, we were able to bring monthly food baskets to families in Yemen through your Giving Tuesday gifts. These food baskets helped mothers like Samiyah, who was raising three children in an active warzone.

Samiyah’s family had no access to social supports and had little food. Most hospitals, roads and bridges in Yemen had been bombed in the civil war, and many homes had no electricity or clean running water. Samiyah’s husband suffered from mental illness and could not work to support the family. When ERDO’s partners met Samiyah, she was one of the poorest people in her community.

Samiyah’s family was supported monthly with a food basket, and they were able to save a little money they’d previously spent on food. Eventually, Samiyah bought an old sewing machine and could take on a few jobs to earn some income. Today, Samiyah provides for her children and pays for her husband’s medication through her sewing business.

Thanks to a little financial support at just the right moment, Samiyah changed her future.

Giving Tuesday 2024

Nutrition and Equipment for Children with Disabilities

Every child deserves to live a full life. But, there are barriers. Poverty is one. Limited access to education and healthcare is another. And disability may be the biggest barrier of all.

Our partner, Children of Blessings Trust, runs health outreach clinics in communities in rural Malawi. These are life-changing for single mothers raising children with disabilities. Not only do the children receive essential nourishment and equipment for their care and dignity, but mothers and families also receive vital support.

For Giving Tuesday in 2024, we raised funds to help bring children with disabilities nutrition and life-changing medical equipment.

Last year, Shama attended our children’s rehabilitation centre in Malawi. He was 3 ½ years old and learning to walk with a walking frame. He was able to use one of these frames twice a week when he came to the clinic. Walking frames are available at the clinic for all the children with disabilities, like Shama, to use.

But, kids with Shama need practice walking more than a couple times a week.

Our partner loans their equipment to children like Shama, so it can be used at home. They build this equipment at the clinic based on each child’s specialized needs. When the family no longer needs the piece, they can return it to the clinic so another child can be helped.

Through Giving Tuesday gifts, Shama was given a walking frame to help him get around at home!

Give to this year’s Giving Tuesday campaign!