Farm Africa turns 30
23 July 2015
In 2015, Farm Africa celebrates 30 years of fighting poverty and hunger in eastern Africa.
Founded by the late Sir Michael Wood and David Campbell, who shared a vision of a prosperous rural Africa, the organisation was registered as a charity on 2 August 1985.
The founders started the organisation in response to the famine in Ethiopia with the firm belief that developing small-scale agriculture was the key to reducing rural poverty.
Speaking at Farm Africa’s recent AGM, David Campbell reflected on his co-founder’s motivation, commenting: “Michael, who seldom spoke about himself, said:
I have concluded after a life’s work as a surgeon in Africa that food is the best medicine. I now want to start an initiative to tackle the problem in new ways.
Sir Michael Wood
Mr Campbell added: “Michael and I both believed passionately in the need to revitalise African agriculture, to break the mould which often inhibited development and to find new more effective strategies.”
Farm Africa’s commitment to reduce poverty permanently for smallholder farmers remains as true today as ever. We remain committed to working in partnership with smallholder communities in eastern Africa, changing lives for good, forever.
Initially Farm Africa focused on assisting extremely poor widows and their children. We helped them by providing goats on credit – one of their goat's kids was returned to Farm Africa and given to another family.
Today, Farm Africa’s work spans four countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, and encompasses programmes focusing on crops, fisheries and forestry as well as livestock. Last year, Farm Africa reached 1.4 million people, the highest number to date.
Farm Africa is proud of its innovative approach and commitment to get the maximum impact for every pound we spend.
Nigel Harris, Chief Executive of Farm Africa, commented: “We are confident that the quality of our work is increasing. We have invested strongly in this area, creating a specialist programme quality and impact team, alongside recruiting thematic experts to lead our technical work across natural resource management, agriculture and private sector engagement. At the same time, we are continuing to innovate, testing ways of working that can create greater value for the communities we support.”
None of Farm Africa’s work would be possible without the generosity and commitment of our donors, volunteers, staff and partners. Thank you to everyone who played a part in allowing Farm Africa to grow from strength to strength over the last 30 years.
