Charity
We are absolutely delighted to announce that for every My Beautiful Bottle sold, we will donate £1 to our nominated charity, Gardens For Health International! So each time you buy a bottle from us, you can feel great about your decision to reduce the number of disposable plastics in the world and and enjoy your new bottle in the knowledge that you have made a real difference to someone's life.
Gardens for Health international
We became aware of GFH about 7 years ago and were deeply moved by what they did and why they did it. Given our own mission to help others nourish their bodies, we cannot be prouder than showing My Beautiful Bottle's support to such an amazing cause.
Attached below is some brief information from GHI from their website:
What We Believe
We believe that growing and eating healthy food can – and must – be a part of the long-term solution to malnutrition.
The world is facing an acute food and nutrition crisis. We must meet the world’s food needs with an approach that is environmentally sustainable, recognises the primacy of nutrition for agriculture and health and strengthens local communities.
Through our work, we are changing the way that malnutrition is treated by moving away from short-term handouts and towards equipping families with the knowledge and resources to grow their own nutritious food and improve their health. We envision a future in which the key to lasting food and nutrient security for vulnerable families lies in their own backyards.
How We Started
GHI was founded in 2007 by Julie Carney, Emma Clippinger, and Dr. Emily Morell Balkin, who believed that agriculture can – and must – play a critical role in addressing large-scale public health challenges. In 2010, in response to Rwanda’s high rate of chronic childhood malnutrition, and the significant political will that exists to tackle this pervasive public health challenge, we launched what is now our core effort: our Health Center Program. Four years later, what began as a pilot project with a dozen families at 2 health centers, has grown into a program that will reach 2,160 families at 18 health centers this year alone.
Our team has approached the design and implementation of our Health Center Program and the policy and capacity-building work that stems from it, through the lens of true community-led development. Our curriculum and training methodology were designed in partnership with mothers that we serve, while our agriculture innovation team works cross-culturally to design interventions that are effective and culturally adaptable. The result is an organisation that meets and responds to the needs of individuals and communities, while simultaneously demonstrating the immense potential that agriculture has to improve health and nutrition throughout the region.
What We Do
At Gardens for Health we are working to transform the way that malnutrition is treated by using agriculture as a key driver of better health. Our innovative approach operates at the nexus of health and agriculture to fight malnutrition by:
- Partnering with health centers in Rwanda to integrate agricultural support and comprehensive health education into the clinical treatment of malnutrition
- Advocating for policies and programs that include agriculture in the prevention and treatment of malnutrition
- Training partners throughout the region who are interested in adapting our model and methodology for their communities
To date, we have worked with nearly 4,000 families through our Health Center Program, helping to ensure that approximately 15,700 people have the healthy food they need to grow and thrive. In 2015 alone, a total of 2,542 children have been enrolled in our program.
In addition to our Health Center Program, we work to build the capacity of the Rwandan health care system and to provide technical assistance to regional partners who are using agriculture to address malnutrition in their own communities. In 2014 we are working as a partner to the District of Musanze, in northern Rwanda, to improve the community level identification, treatment and prevention of malnutrition. We are training government Nutritionists, Agronomists, Community Health Workers and Village Agriculture Promoters. We are also providing training and technical support to NGO partners throughout the region, who are interested in adapting our model to fit their communities.
Why We Do It
A 2013 Save the Children report estimates that 165 million children around the world are malnourished. Malnutrition contributes to nearly one third of all early childhood deaths in sub-Saharan Africa. While the loss of life is overwhelming, the loss of human capital is equally sobering. Children who lack adequate nutrition in their formative years are less likely to attend school and, when they do, they are less likely to succeed. On average, these children earn less and die at a younger age than their healthy peers.
In Rwanda, where our core program operates, malnutrition is a pervasive challenge that threatens to undermine both the health and economic growth of the nation. A recent study investigating the cost of hunger estimates that malnutrition costs Rwanda 11.5% of its GDP and is a contributing factor in 21.9% of child mortalities. Despite the fact that 85% of Rwanda’s population is engaged in agriculture, 44% of children under the age of five are chronically malnourished. We work to bridge that gap.
Globally, malnutrition is one of the critical challenges of our day. However, in too many cases the system is equipped only to provide short-term interventions. By broadening the treatment of malnutrition beyond the clinic walls, and using agriculture as a key driver of better nutrition and health, we hope to transform the way that malnutrition is treated in Rwanda, and throughout the region.
GHI's efforts to date have made a huge impact on those involved and we are delighted to support their continued & growing efforts.
For more information, please visit Gardens For Health International's website: http://www.gardensforhealth.org/
Please keep in touch with us as we'll be updating our members on how the money we raise together will directly assist in the various projects with GHI.