AIDS Children

Posted on August 22, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

Unicef’s statistics state that there are 143 million orphans worldwide, many of them are AIDS children. In Zambia alone there are 710,000 orphans. Heartbreaking data for children who don’t ask to be born. With one in six adults living with the virus, HIV and AIDS in Zambia is a mammouth problem and education is the key to overcoming the pandemic. Being one of the poorest and least developed nations on earth Zambia sadly has one of the highest statistics in the world.

AIDS children at Kamwi Village orphan sponsorship at Mukuni

The Butterfly Tree’s aim is to assist these AIDS children by providing improved education and health facilities and safe, clean drinking water. Without these essentials in place there is little hope for the future of these vulnerable children. It is not only the poor that have been affected but many in the public sector and agriculture, causing a weakening in the economy. Young women and children are most at risk, prior to the HIV/AIDS pandemic ‘street children’ were virtually unheard of in Zambia now there are thousands of AIDS children roaming the street, begging for food and shelter. Widows are also at high risk, having no source of income leads them to using sex to earn money to feed their children. “AIDS may kill me in months or years, but hunger will kill me and my family tomorrow” is believed to be said by women in Zambia.

How can we help? The Butterfly Tree is working at grass root levels with the local health and education authorities and raising awareness both in the UK and globally to help the world fight against HIV/AIDS. We have a number of projects including workshops and voluntary testing, feeding programs to prevent the transmission of HIV/AIDS from mother to child replacing breastmilk with formula and an orphan sponsorship program.

HIV/AIDS support group & under fives feeding program – sponsored by The Butterfly Tree

How can you help? Sponsor an orphan can give a child an edcuation and a chance to make a difference. Donating to one of our projects in water, education or health improvements is invaluable. We are currently doing an appeal to fund community houses for widows and orphans in Mukuni Village; my two sons are joining me in Zambia next month to build these homes. No doubt there will be many more orphans in need of support since my last visit. Your generosity can give these AIDS children the chance in life they are worthy of.

Sponsor Zambian Orphan

Posted on August 13, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

With the school holidays under way and the children enjoying their summer break, surprisingly African children actually prefer to be at school. Staying at home in a rural village holds very little appeal. There are no televisions, computer games or toys to occupy them nor theme parks and cinemas to visit; most children do not leave their villages, the cost and distance too great to venture away from their community. Sadly the majority of these children have not seen the Victoria Falls despite this spectacular site lying just seven kilometers from Mukuni Village.

Life for an orphan is tough, having to depend on a guardian or an elderly grandparent to provide accomodation and food is particularly difficult. These children have mainly been orphaned as a result of the HIV/AIDS in Zambia pandemic. School is their only hope, providing an education for these vulnerable children gives them a chance in life. Attending school is much more preferable than staying at home where there is nothing to do other than helping with the daily chores, fetching water, carrying wood and caring for their younger siblings.

Sponsor an Orphan: young children from Mukuni Village

The Butterfly Tree urges everyone to sponsor an orphan; whether you are an individual, company or school – for just £95 per annum or £8 per month a child can receive an educaton. We believe that every child has a right to education, something we take for granted in the west; there are thousands of African children who do not have this privilege. Our orphan sponsorship program is overseen by a group of female volunteers who source the most vulnerable children and oversee their welfare, we are currently sponsoring over 200 orphans who are benefitting from this program. To sponsor an orphan complete the form and donate using our secure online donation page.

Houses for Mukuni

Posted on August 4, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

My sons, Mike and David have volunteered to go to Zambia to build homes for Mukuni, but first they have to raise the funds for the materials. They will work with the local builders, in temperatures reaching 35 degrees to provide at least one home for a widow and orphans during their stay. The cost per house is £400 to build a sturdy, substantial structure with a concrete floor and they will also include the mattresses.

A dwelling in Mukuni Village

Accomodation, in remote communities such as Mukuni Village, is primitive. A mud-hut dwelling for most, three huts for the more prosperous families – one a sleeping quarter for men, the other for women and young children and one for the kitchen. Sadly there are thousands of widows and orphans who have no income to repair or build new homes. The thatching, which should be done every five years, becomes neglected causing leaks during the rainy season, holes appear creating drafts in the winter months when the temperatures drop to below 4 degrees.

Homes for Mukuni: A new house built by The Butterfly Tree

Mike and David are appealing for everyone to donate just £3, the cost of one less pint of beer on a Saturday night! All the money will be used for the project, no deductions will be made. The result – secure, spacious and comfortable accommodation for a vulnerable family, which will last for many years. To make a donation Mike has created a page, ‘The Kayes get Physcial’, on Just Giving; alternatively you can make a donation on The Butterfly Tree website.

Victoria Falls – Zambia

Posted on July 29, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

Victoria Falls, Zambia is one of the severn natural wonders of the world and one of the most stunning places on earth. Just a few miles from the tourism capitol of Livingstone and a boundary between Zambia and Zimbabwe, this breathtaking spectacle occurs. Standing 108 meters high at the height of the floods the Victoria Falls form the largest sheet of falling water in the world. Over 545 million cubic metres a minute (9 million meters per second) cascade over the edge. It has a span of 1,708 meters of which 1,200 is in Zambia, reputed to have the most spectacular views from this side of the Zambezi.

Victoria Falls – Zambia

For most visitors to Southern Africa it is a must, staying in hotels, such as Sun International’s Royal Livingstone and Zambezi Sun on the edge of the mighty Zambezi River, flowing some 2,200 miles from it’s source in Northern Zambia, finally reaching its destination in the Indian Ocean. In 1855 David Livingstone was the first European to discover the Victoria Falls, formerly know as the Mosi-oa-Tunya meaning the Smoke that Thunders, the name is still used by the local Leya people.

Zambezi River – the ‘Smoke that Thunders’ in the background

The Holy ground of the Victoria Falls region has been a place of worship to the Leya people for centuries. Bene Mukuni Kingdom is the permanent traditional headquarters of the Leya people. It is one of the largest of its kind in Africa and is unique in having two palaces, Lumpasa for the male ruler and Nanjina for the female co-ruler. Every year the Lwiindi Ceremony takes place over the New Year period, this is The Cultural Feast of The Spray Ceremony of the Victoria Falls.

If you are visiting the Victoria Falls, please take time to visit Mukuni Village, where the The Butterfly Tree runs its organisation in Zambia. We fund a number of projects to support these gentle people who have suffered so much from the HIV/AIDS in Zambia pandemic, leaving thousands of children orphaned. If you would like to take a private tour around the school and the village please contact jane@thebutterflytree.org.uk

Charity Annual Report

Posted on July 21, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

I am delighted to report that The Butterfly Tree has had an extremely successful year, despite the global crisis. Each year since March 2006 we have been able to reach out to more rural schools and villages. This is due to several factors: the continual sourcing of new funds and grants, spreading awareness, promoting the charity through the tourist industry and our website which resulted in a Google AdWords charity award. Last September we were shortlisted to the final five of the ‘Best New Charity of the Year’ at the Charity Times Awards in London.

Working with the tourist industry to reduce world poverty, The Butterfly Tree was chosen as the official charity at the 2008 European Travel Distribution Summit, where we hosted a seminar on philanthropic travel and corporate social initiatives. We have recently been featured in Conde Nast Traveler and numerous tourists who have visited Zambia have offered support. All of these achievements have helped The Butterfly Tree to gain international recognition and increase awareness of the significant work we are doing in these remote communities.

The Zambian team is based in Mukuni Village close to the Victoria Falls and it is here where all the projects are initiated. They are an amazing group of people and I would like to thank them for their tireless efforts – the secretary who does a wonderful job of administering the charity, all of the committee and the ten female representatives who look after the welfare of the orphans. A special thanks to Chief Mukuni for his counsel and to the Bedyango, Chieftainess of Mukuni.

Although all the projects we fund are of great importance water is the most vital. Seeing people drinking from crocodile-infested rivers is very distressing; seeing the six new bore holes, four of them situated in schools, is a very humbling experience and has made a huge difference to the lives of over two and a half thousand children.

Supporting these developing countries, working with local authorities and increasing grass root projects, is crucial. Zambia has one of the highest rates of HIV in the world; Africa malaria is another of the serious diseases. This year the World Health Organisation selected Zambia as a role model after seeing a 66% reduction in malaria mortality during the last decade. Other major problems are TB, malnutrition, lack of safe water, poor health and education facilities. Poverty is the cause of most of these issues as 64% of the population is living on less than fifty pence a day.

Our most challenging project this year is to extend the health centre and school at Katapazi, some two hour drive from Mukuni. A male ward will be added to the clinic and a new classroom for older school pupils up to grade nine. As always, children remain the focal point of our work and the number of HIV/AIDS orphans is still far too high. Although we are currently supporting two hundred, we need many more people to sponsor an orphan. All our programs are for the benefit of these vulnerable children. They are the future and by educating them they are the ones who can make a considerable difference. Many of the orphans will be involved in the sustainable projects we are setting up with the schools.

This has been the Butterfly Tree’s finest year to date both in fundraising in achievements. However I feel I cannot fail to mention the period in November which shook all of us when Lawrence Bailey, my late husband, was tragically killed in a helicopter accident. He was a great support to both me and the charity and gave generously both his time and money. An astounding £7500 was donated to The Butterfly Tree in Lawrence’s memory.

I sincerely thank everyone who has contributed to the growth and success of the charity this year, regrettably too many to mention individually, though each has helped us to achieve our aims. My thanks to the volunteers in the UK, to those who have travelled from England, USA and Australia to work at the schools and clinic, and to the medical companies who have donated valuable supplies. I would like to welcome Miranda de Freston to the board of trustees and thank her for providing and hosting the website, attracting a huge number of global followers. All the support we have received has given us the resources to equip these remote communities with the essentials in life that so many of us take for granted – water, food, health and education.

View the full Charity Annual Report Here

Jane Kaye-Bailey

Chairman

Schools linked to Mukuni

Posted on July 10, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

When a young girl called Shaila wrote to me this week and told me that she wanted to donate £30 of her birthday money to The Butterfly Tree I was really touched by this thoughtful gesture. The charity receives numerous donations from individuals, tourists, corporate and grants some of them substantial, though none could have been more sincere than the gift from Shaila.

Most African children like others from developing countries do not receive birthday or Christmas gifts and in the orphanges a number of them don’t even have a date of birth, their ages have to be estimated. It is important to make our children understand that not every child is as priviliged as they are and to teach them to realise that for some safe, clean water and food are gifts, commodities that we all take for granted.

We now have several schools supporting The Butterfly Tree. Seeing how responsive these pupils are after talking to them and showing photos of the Mukuni makes me realise that every school should support a charity of some kind; linking with a school in a remote village of Zambia is both educational and rewarding. It takes little effort: a non-uniform day could raise money to sponsor an orphan or provide much needed educational supplies. Having a cake stall as did our village school which brought in £210 for an orphan and school materials. One school is currently raising funds for bicycles, while another is providing special needs equipment for Mukuni Basic School.

Whether you are a pupil, teacher or a parent try to get your school involved and join the list of schools already supporting The Buttlerfly: Wolverton Primary, Marston Green Primary, St. Alban’s Primary, Fountaindale Specialist SEN, Arden School. If your school would like to sponsor an orphan you can give a child an education and make a difference to someone’s life.

Special Needs Help for Mukuni

Posted on July 5, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

In most western countries children with physical or mental special needs are able to receive an education, African children are less fortunate. Last year the Zambian government provided Mukuni Basic School with a special educational needs teacher and that was all. No materials, no equipment or transportation for children in outreach villages who are physically disabled, life is tough for these special African children.

Special Needs for Mukuni: Idrin Gani is disabled and now rides a donkey to school

Fortunately thanks to two generous offers The Butterfly Tree is now able to set up a new program for these disadvantaged pupils at Mukuni Basic School. St. James’ Place Foundation has given us a generous donation to purchase materials and equipment, after one of their partners and his wife visited Zambia.

Leonnie Mangan who works for Fountaindale School in Mansfield, a Specialist SEN School and the largest in the UK, volunteered to go out to Mukuni with her sister in July 2008. Working on behalf of The Butterfly Tree they assisted at Mukuni Health Centre and school. After seeing how little funding the special education teacher had to run her classes, on her return home Leonnie got her own school involved. Fountaindale have offered to provide some of the essential books and materials and are currently looking into setting up a teachers’ exchange program. The children at this school have also raised funds, one little boy who has to be intranenously fed said that he’d like to raise funds so that the African children could have some nice food.

This is a great boost for Mukuni. The Butterfly Tree is also raising funds to purchase donkeys to transport the disabled children who are unable to walk to school. If anyone would like to donate a donkey the cost is £70.

Food for Mukuni

Posted on June 23, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

One billion people throughout the world suffer from hunger, a figure which has increased by 100 million because of the global financial crisis, says the United Nations. We are all complaining about the effect the world reccession is having upon us, but do we give a thought as to how badly people are affected in the developing countries. Lower incomes, unemployment, reduced foreign investment increase in food prices have attributed to a record number of people suffering from hunger and yet in the developed world relatively few are affected.

Zambia is in Sub-Sahara Africa where 265 million people are hungry, many relying on food aid. In the past twelve months The Butterfly Tree has provided bore holes to four schools and two villages in Mukuni now we need to use that water to develop agriculture and for the communities to grow food so that they can become sustainable. I hear sad stories of African children unable to walk the long distance to school due to lack of food, pupils who are lethargic in class and have actually seen a number of them fall asleep over their desks. I recently met a mother with twins who had walked three miles to the clinic, the infants were suffering from malnutrition, she hadn’t eaten for twenty-four hours having no money to buy a bag of ground maize. They are now receiving aid through our under fives feeding program.

Food for Mukuni – mother & twins no longer suffering from hunger

More feeding programs are needed until these communities can become sustainable, a difficult task with ever increasing costs, floods and elephants destroying crops. The Butterfly Tree is currently providing a feeding program, sponsored by Cunninghams, for over 500 vulnerable and orphaned children at Mukuni Basic School. We have just commenced a second program at Siamasimbi Basic School. Each day the pupils are given a nutritional meal of Nshima (ground maize), meat or dried fish (kapenta) and vegetables.

Feeding programs like this one at Mukuni needed for more schools

We are seeking micro-financing so that groups of widows, schools and communities can grow crops, produce goats and chickens for meat and eggs, fish farming and fruit trees.

HIV Funding

Posted on June 20, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

Although The Butterfly Tree is making great progress with a number of projects in the Mukuni Chiefdom, more HIV funding is needed. HIV and AIDS in Zambia is pandemic, one in six adults are living with HIV. Every person has been infected or is effected by this devastating disease. The government has a number of initiatives but not enough HIV funding is getting through to the remote villages.

The Butterfly Tree provides funds for an under fives’ feeding program, the first to be initiated in Zambia. We provide formula to replace breast milk in mothers who are HIV positive, preventing mother to child transmission and this has also encouraged more women to come forward to be tested. Unfortunately formula is very expensive therefore we are looking into goat rearing to produce milk, mothers who have benefitted from our program are keen to get a sustainable income to provide HIV funding to help others in the same situation.

HIV funding: Two young boys from Kafekwa on the under fives’ feeding program

The Tusolwe Lwangunko HIV/AIDS Support Group Zambia, is run by a group of volunteers providing workshops, voluntary testing and sensitization programs. They rely on support from The Butterfly Tree to provide HIV funding and we have bought them goats to give them a sustainable generating income. I have worked with these people, they do an amazing job, based at Mukuni Health Centre, covering a vast area of the Chiefdom, encouring the communities to be tested and remove the stigmatism, the work is invaluable and we need to be able to expand on this.

HIV funding: HIV positive mother proudly presents her healthy baby

The most devastating is the number of AIDS orphans, over 400 in Mukuni alone and many more in surrounding villages. The only way to overcome the problem is to provide education for the children and teenagers. I believe they are the generation who could make the change. In Zambia the longevity is 34, they need our help to prevent them losing the next generation. By educating the pupils about the dangers of HIV and AIDS they will have a chance. We provide TMEs educational DVDs in each of the schools we operate and have distributed copies all over the nation. To help us educate these children you can, help via our orphan sponsorship scheme, for only £95 per annum (£8 per month).

Of all our programs supporting the HIV projects, education is one of the most essential, without this none of our other projects can be effective. We need to operate in more clinics, spread more awareness and provide more HIV funding to reach out to these rural people.

Milestone for Charity

Posted on June 11, 2009 by Jane Kaye-Bailey

The Butterfly Tree has achieved a huge milestone. In the three years since we have been working at Mukuni Village the charity has raised over £250,000. Alongside this amazing amount we have sent as much again in donated medical and education supplies, clothing, blankets and equipment. The lives of thousands of people in the Mukuni Chiefdom and their facilities have been improved with this funding. Over twenty villages and six schools are receiving support from the charity and communities throughout Zambia are benefitting from the edcational DVDs we are distributing on behalf of TME.

Milestone for charity: Mukuni and Ng’andu pupils supported by The Butterfly Tree

From Hawaii to Australia our supporters are helping us to make a difference. Individuals, schools, corporates and trusts have supported The Butterfly Tree in our fight against world poverty. Worldeka is a collaborative platform designed to help you connect and create change and I am thrilled to say that we have just won a camcorder for our dynamic profile page on their website. Although Twitter and Facebook are great for social networking, Worldeka is the social network with a conscious bringing together people who are interested in charitable causes. You can hear the Mukuni children singing on Youtube.

Daily I am receiving offers of support from the likes of Kabaso who sell curios from Zambia donating all their profits to the charity, tour operators, schools wishing to raise funds for the African children and individuals who want to sponsor an orphan. All of this means that we can spread our work to other remote communities in Zambia.

Siamasimbi: providing health care supported by the charity

Our website is attracting donors from all over the globe, thanks to the dedicated work of Miranda De Freston of Juggle Frogs donating the website and her time to improve the networking of The Butterfly Tree. We welcome Miranda onto our board of Trustees and Leonnie Mangan who is setting up a program for special needs children at Mukuni Basic School, has joined our team and Mary Luckman and Ann Sutton have volunteered to help with the administration.

Much more needs to be done and there are many ways you can now help us reach half million pounds. Use everyclick the search engine, every time you click it rasies money for charity and currently you have the chance to win a Fiat 500 while raising money for The Butterfly Tree. Buy Once give Twice the charity auction site where you can add tickets, unwanted gifts or holiday accommodation and donate to the chartiy. Join us on Cleversquirrel and raise money for The Butterfly Tree, without you haivng to give any new money. Buying and selling on ebay for charities, take part in a sporting activity or get involved with one of our projects at Mukuni; anything however small can help us make a difference.

We are delighted that The Butterfly Tree is growing and still receiving funds despite the global crisis, thank you to everyone who has supported us. Zambia like many developing countries has been badly affected by the west’s problems; these rural communites need our charity – help us reach the next milestone!