Seeds of Hope, Peru - review 2009

2008 has been another fantastic year for Seeds of Hope of which the One Percent Scheme has played an important part.

They have doubled their number of volunteers, this extra help has enabled projects such the opening of the cafe in Huaraz and the building of a home for one of the childen's families. Although the number of children attending Seeds has remained fairly stable of this year, new initiatives such as home and school visits with a social worker has strengthened the relationships between Seeds and the children's families. As part of the problem in getting the children to school is that the parents want them to work and earn money, these relationships are invaluable in encouraging families to allow their children to be educated. 

So just to recap, our money this year was spent on:

- Decorating the cafe: buying tables, chairs, paint and curtains
- School materials and uniforms
- The design, printing and distribution of the Seeds christmas cards, a key fundraiser
- The Christmas Party!

The majority of funding for Seeds of Hope primarily comes from volunteer payments, and these can vary greatly throughout the year making it very difficult to plan for the future. Our money is invaluable to Seeds because it's one of their only secure income streams. 

Seeds of Hope have written a very thorough plan of how they intend to spend the money (see link below) but the main intention is to focus fully on some of the children's specific needs. For example our money will help to:

- Enable Seeds to buy food that will contribute to a better balanced diet for the children.
- Buy a laptop for the school which the children can use for homework and also to communicate with their new British penpals!
- Organise excursions to the beach as many of the children have never seen the sea!
- Organise workshops for the older children on how to create microbusinesses.

I have really enjoyed my contact with Seeds again this year. One of the volunteers that I was raving about last election sadly left Seeds this year but her successor has been just as enthusiastic and has always kept us well informed. It would be great to support their proposals again this year.

Anna Ray, January 2009

OPS - Seeds of Hope Proposal 2009.pdf(1478 KB)