Clean drinking water

We have funded a well in the Ethiopian village of Guramba Bata since 2015. The well is about 130 meters deep. Over the next 20 years (the technical life of infrastructure), we will produce at least 525 million litres of clean drinking water.

The water is led to four consumption points, among which a school and a health centre. A group of people have been trained to maintain the drinking water infrastructure. Coaches have also been trained to encourage people to change their hygiene behaviour. In 2020, we will explore the possibilities for new clean drinking water projects in Africa.

In Congo we support a project that focuses on empowering vulnerable women. For example, by improving socio-economic conditions and combating sexual exploitation and human rights violations. Because of warfare, women regularly become the victims of violence. This can lead to women being expelled from their communities. 

Moreover, the Ebola outbreak is also a major problem in the region. Together with local NGOs, Vreugdenhil makes a financial contribution to improving the position of women. This gives them the opportunity to follow training courses to be able to live independently in peace. This project has reached 898 people, of whom 665 women and 233 men.

Having children in Liberia start their school day with a nutritious meal is the goal of the Milky Gari project that we launched in 2018 in partnership with our customer Hoogwegt. Because many children in Liberia are malnourished and do not go to school. Milky Gari is a nutritious porridge based on our enriched milk powder, cassava and soya flour. International relief and recovery organisation ZOA provides this porridge to schoolgoing children. This is an additional reason for many parents to send their children to school. Local farmers supply the cassava and receive training in increasing their yields. Local companies process the cassava into porridge (Gari). This generates additional income, which in turn contributes to the opportunity to buy school uniforms and books for schoolgoing children. This local approach makes ZOA unique in the region. In 2018, we started offering Milky Gari and since 2019 we have been supplying seven schools. In total we have reached 1956 children. Our ambition is to continue the project at these schools in 2020.