e’Pap Children’s Feeding Project February 2009

Established in 2003

Run by a team of 50

volunteers

Supporting 40+ schools and places of care

Feeding over 2800 children.

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e’Pap is ..

A pre-cooked porridge

Blend of maize & soya and high in vitamins &

minerals

Easy to serve, just add water or milk.

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Contacts:

Shelley Godsell 0027 44 384 1237

shelley@epapfeeding.co.za

Lally Viljoen 0027 44 384 0309

Annie Ogilvie 084 804 0028

Web site

www.epapfeeding.co.za

NPO : 066-865

A small management team was formed to help Shelley & Lally extend the reach. Did it work? – You bet, our team has been a great success in spreading the organizing load and our numbers of children doubled! We also:

• installed more outdoor equipment especially at the largest project we have tackled to date, Buffelsnek Primary School, and a separate area for the younger children of that community.

• started feeding at a very large school, Tembelitsha Primary. • expanded our service to children with disabilities and saw massive growth

in the Plettenberg Bay area. 2008 was a great year, but ….

A Challenging Year Lies Ahead As we contemplate the new year, we are aware that for many, this is going to be a tough year. For the man who has been made redundant and is battling to put food on the table – let alone pay Pre-school fees – it is of no comfort that our economy is not as stressed as some others. For the single mum who has her working hours cut, making ends meet is a battle that restarts again each day. As last year progressed, we noticed that the amount of e’Pap being used per child increased, probably because there was less food at home. Our project of providing nutrition has always been important, and for some, has always been vital. This coming year its importance is going to ratchet up a notch or two and this presents us with three challenges. Firstly, as demand for our e’Pap feeding increases we are going to need extra resources – more funds and more volunteers. Our number of donors is indeed increasing steadily and our current donors remain faithful, so we remain gratefully confident that the “money will arrive”. Perhaps finding the extra volunteers may be a bit more challenging, but if we all keep our antennae sensitive to new possibilities, we should succeed here as well. . We can only address this need if we have reliable and responsible individuals and organizations to handle the service delivery. We need to be creative. We need to

As we begin ……. A new year has commenced and there are some exciting new possibilities and challenges for the e’Pap team, but first let’s reflect on our activities and joys of 2008. We started the year brainstorming, knowing that we had the funding needed to reach a larger number of needy children, but wanting to retain the joy of working in small teams, as well as remaining sustainable.

Secondly we need to continue our efforts to ensure that all aspects of our work are sustainable. We made good progress last year by initiatives such as the formation of the management committee and the appointment of a part-time secretary. We will continue our quest to ensure that our project continues to thrive. The third and last challenge is finding ways of providing nutrition to the many children who are not attending a Pre-school. We think that this group will grow as jobs become more difficult to find and families look for ways to economize. We can only address this need if we have reliable and responsible individuals and organizations to handle the service delivery. We need to be creative. We need to find new partners. We need to ensure that we remain good stewards of our donors’ money. This is probably the key challenge of the New Year.

Three challenges for the year ahead, none of them trivial. However, if the past is any guide, we will be blessed with new resources, new volunteers and new ideas. This, coupled with our faith will surely see us rise to these challenges. Of course, we will also need to stay alert, nimble and responsive so that when unforeseen opportunities and challenges surface we can respond enthusiastically, effectively and in a way that keeps us true to our goal to nourish, uplift & empower. Donors - new and old

Rotary clubs, both local and overseas, have been faithful supporters. Harwich/Dovercourt Rotary – encouraged by Acland & Jane Madge and Greg & Nicky Pye – have just made their FOURTH annual contribution and Knysna Rotary is one of the founding donors. In January, Peter Manby who was in Knysna on holiday, handed over a generous cheque from the Stokers Golf Club in the UK. Our many overseas friends continue to provide funds. Some of our newest donors are Gavin Bath, Brooke Chambers (shown on left) and Jill Mc Coll from NZ. Recent visitors to our project - Shelley & Derek Pitter, Gill & Peter Kingham, Lesley &

Michael Flaxman, Penny & Patrick Fleming, Margaret & Gordon Crabbe and David & Anne Barnardo are amongst our many supporters from the UK. New South African supporters continue to show generosity and genuine interest in the project. One of our latest and youngest, Gareth Utton, is shown on the right. We are delighted that so many young people – many of them relatives of our volunteers and donors - are motivated to become involved. Woman & Home readers support e’Pap Late last year Loren Minsky from Woman & Home magazine approached Shelley with an invitation to participate in a “Gifts that give back” project. The idea was to challenge readers to give a gift to charity in the name of someone, instead of giving that person a gift. The magazine was drawing up a list of charities from which the readers could choose. “Would e’Pap Children’s Feeding Project like to be one of the charities?” What a question! Throughout December and early into the year we had a steady stream of readers emailing us for information, checking our website and best of all sending us funds. Each day contributions of R100 or more were received. Not only was over R 7,000 received by this initiative, but many new “Friends of e’Pap” were made. Our thanks to Woman & Home readers and Loren Minsky for having a wonderfully different Christmas idea.

Shelley would particularly like to thank Lally and June for keeping the e’Pap ship afloat while she and Peter were overseas attending their son’s

wedding and visiting family. Our project is blessed with a depth of leadership and commitment.

Volunteers – Completely different, completely the same Each year we laud our volunteers – that group of people who are the amazing magicians who turn donor money into well-fed children. They live in Sedgefield, Knysna and Plettenberg Bay. Some work, some are retired. Some are young and some not so young. Many are ladies but we have some men too. Our volunteers are indeed different. But when it comes to why they serve they have much in common. They all are committed to the welfare of the children, they find they are blessed by their involvement, they all feel a sense of worth being part of the team, all want to build bridges between people and so make a contribution to a better South Africa. They are so similar. There is one other area where they are the same – they are all appreciated and loved for what they do and who they are. God bless the e’Pap volunteers. e’Pap does Teacher Training Our formal bursary scheme to support Pre-school teacher training commenced in 2007, with an earmarked donation from the Garden Route Children’s Trust in the UK which paid for our first student, Dorothy Hartzenberg to attend the Level 1 course in Pre-school teacher training at the Klein Karoo Resource Centre in Oudsthoorn. The GRCT also gave bursaries which covered the costs of tuition, accommodation and transport for our four students in 2008. These students were:

Gladys Gungu-Thomas, Principal of I Kamva Lethu Cynthia Totito, Principal - I Linga Lom Afrika Ethel Sedibe, Principal - Siyafunda Pre-school Cynthia Malemlela, a teacher at Playtime Pre-school

All of them completed the eight modules required for Level 5 and their performance resulted in being awarded Learnerships for the Diploma Course in Pre-school Education in 2009 by the Education Department. This Learnership award consists of a monthly stipend to cover accommodation and transport costs. In addition the full tuition fee is paid by the Education Department. So all four of last year’s students have succeeded and moved on to an even higher level of education. We are sure that their schools and the children in them will benefit from their new skills and greater understanding. In 2009 our original student Dorothy Hartzenberg returns to college to do her Level 4 training. To date these five teachers have made great strides in their competency as Pre-school teachers and we would like to join them in thanking the Garden Route Trust for making this possible. Annie in her stride

Annie joined us early in 2008 and is now thoroughly in her stride. Her “evening job” is largely about communication and information. Much of the communication with donors and volunteers is now handled by Annie and when the Godsells were “down under” she managed the successful Woman and Home initiative, writing countless thank-you letters, and together with Penny Mainwaring designed a beautiful card to send to all those who responded. Annie is also building a donor database so as to manage that communication more efficiently and get our e’Pap usage records into better shape – Yes Annie is busy! But happily so and this is why:

“Firstly and unquestionably - this is God's work!! It's God's work because many people pray daily for this project, hungry children have full tummies, loving people are freely giving, and volunteers are humbly serving towards a mission and vision that God surely smiles upon. I really wanted to be involved!

Secondly, I love this work because everything it stands for contributes to one of my deepest values of building bridges that so often divide us as human beings. What a gift to see rich and poor, old and young, black and white building relationships and growing in love - having fun and 'doing' life together - sharing stories and teaching each other. It has been a great joy to hear rich testimonies from volunteers, donors, teachers and through the very smiles of the children that this project is bringing life and joy to all who give and all who receive.” Thirdly, I got involved with e'Pap because of a huge respect and love for Peter and Shelley. They are truly wonderful folk to work with - deeply committed and passionate about their ministry and the welfare of the children, concerned about their volunteers and highly honourable and discerning with their stewardship towards every cent that's donated. So being the e'Pap secretary has been a great blessing in my life and I hope that I can continue to play an active and participative role for many years to come. A huge thanks to all for your love and care, help and support.” On the web and on the move

Getting information to our donors, potential donors and volunteers and doing it economically is vital to a project like ours. So in June last year we launched our website www.epapfeeding.co.za. During the first six months we have had over 800 visits to our website which is very pleasing. What has surprised us is the amazing variety of countries from which these visitors have come. In addition to South Africa we have had visitors from Australia, India, Ireland, Netherlands, New Zealand, Tanzania, UK and the USA. Take a peek at: www.epapfeeding.co.za

So what is so special about e’Pap? e’Pap is packed with the vitamins and trace elements that are needed to build strong and healthy bodies. Equally important is the fact that these vital ingredients are in a form that is highly absorbable. Putting it in another way - e’Pap has very good stuff in it and in a form that our bodies can really use it. Basil Kransdorff, the scientist who developed the product puts it much more eloquently: “ Why is e'Pap so special - Well it is special because its formulation is focused on issues around bio-availability and so we use one of the most expensive nutritional chemical formulae used by many top sportsmen in the USA. The objective of the formulation approach - to make children nutrient replete so that they can become functional human beings able to learn and participate as responsible human beings.” Looking to the future Basil says “The challenge for e'Pap in the New Year is to evaluate new technologies to further enhance the benefit and effect that e'Pap brings and to share our knowledge and expertise with Governments and International NGOs so that they can enhance their nutritional programs in HIV support, school feeding and fortification. e'Pap is now in over 15 African countries, helping manage the many challenges on our continent.” e’Pap is a pre-cooked porridge which is a blend of maize, soya, vitamins and minerals which are in a highly absorbable form. It is pre-cooked thus saves on gas & electricity, easy to serve and packed with vitamins and minerals.