When there is a global crisis, we can sometimes feel the urge to retreat into our small corners and forget about those in need around us. But at Ripple Effect we know that one small deed can go a long way, and that when we leave people to suffer alone those repercussions will come back to us too. We live in a globalised world where we must look after each other if we wish to survive and thrive.

I have been with Ripple Effect a long time and I can say that this is an unprecedented crisis. We have a duty to act, even if what we have is only small. We can share it with those who have less.  

Farmers have been hit by a triple crisis. First the Covid-19 pandemic, then the global cost of living crisis and now extreme drought caused by the climate crisis.    

For many smallholder farmers in rural Africa, restrictions on movement caused by the pandemic meant that they could not get to local markets to sell their produce, so their businesses crumbled.    

The global cost of living crisis has forced dramatic price rises in all the countries where Ripple Effect works. In Ethiopia for example, inflation is over 30%. and in Rwanda, food inflation is at 59%.

These extreme price rises mean that the poorest who live without a buffer of disposable income are having to go without essentials such as food, clothes and soap. Some families are having to choose who goes hungry each day.   

Add to this the pressures of the climate crisis and you have the makings of the worst hunger crisis in Eastern Africa for 40 years.

The window of opportunity to help is short. Farmers must plant before the next growing season, but many of them have lost the seeds they would have saved to plant due to the extreme drought: the crop either failed in the field or was eaten when food was scarce.    

With nothing to plant, families face a summer of deep hunger unless we stand in solidarity with them.

I have dusted off the desk cycle and am challenging myself to Peddle the equivalent of Lands End to John O Groats a distance of 870ish miles in March whilst doing my desk job! So for the cost of a coffee or a slice of cake, please donate to support these wonderful people that we work with.