CAMFED (Zimbabwe / Zambia)
CAMFED is a pan-African movement revolutionising how girls’ education is delivered. CAMFED supports girls from the most marginalised backgrounds through school and beyond, radically improving their prospects of becoming independent and influential women.
In 2022/2023, the Eurofins Foundation renewed its support to CAMFED, specifically supporting the programme “Mobilising resources to combat childhood hunger in rural Zimbabwe”.
The objective of the project was to help 100 schools in rural Zimbabwe provide over 200,000 meals for children during the dry months when food is scarce in homes.
By December 2023, CAMFED will have provided 233,629 meals, ramping up the provision of school meals particularly during Zimbabwe’s dry season (April to October), which constitutes the most challenging six months of the year in terms of food security. This work has helped to ease child hunger during this period of lower crop yields and extended droughts, intensified by climate change, and - in turn - has helped to tackle one of the leading causes of school drop out.
The CAMFED / Eurofins Foundation’s partnership has also helped scaling-up existing school meal programmes at the target schools. These can now cater for more children in the school and in turn
improve morale and focus amongst students. From the beginning of the project to the time of reporting, the average (mean) number of children being reached by schools with active feeding programmes rose from 208 children per school per term to 363 children per school per term, a rise of 75%.
By the time of reporting, 72% of schools were providing meals once or twice a week, while 15% of schools were providing meals once or twice per day. In addition, 79% reported an increase in the nutritional value of meals served at schools, as they are able to provide a wider range of food to children, including vegetables, meat, fish and dairy. Anecdotal evidence collected through monitoring suggests that this has improved attendance and retention of learners; for example, the Head Teacher at Masarakufa Secondary School indicated that school meals are “a major factor to the increase of school attendance”.
These projects contribute to the following United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals
