CHARITY Global Care is searching for ‘harvest heroes’ to take on its Slum Supper Challenge.
Over the harvest season, Global Care – based in the West Midlands region – is inviting people to take up the challenge of living on a restricted diet for five days.
The diet is based on emergency food parcels which Global Care has given to families in Patripul, a slum near Mumbai, throughout India’s extended lockdown due to the global Coronavirus pandemic.
Participants will be sponsored to live on the ‘slum supper’ for five days. Each person will have to manage on around 1300 calories per day, and only water to drink.
All the money raised will go to Global Care’s Children at Risk fund – an intervention fund which Global Care is using to meet urgent feeding and hygiene needs for vulnerable children.
Families supported by Global Care overseas struggled to afford food even before the pandemic, and the economic effects of the crisis have been catastrophic for many.
In the last three months the charity has spent or allocated almost £90,000 delivering food and hygiene supplies to vulnerable families in eleven countries. And the pandemic is far from over.
The Slum Supper Challenge is on August 24 a28 with participants encouraged to share their journey on social media. People who want to take part but are unable to participate that week, have until September 12 to complete their challenge.
John White, Coventry-based Global Care’s chief executive, said: “For three months we have been supporting communities without running water, with poor access to food or no money for food, no healthcare, and living in overcrowded, basic homes. They have little resilience against coronavirus.
“The simple truth is that children and families are starving to death, and we have to keep working to reach these vulnerable families. We hope people will take up our challenge, not only to stand in solidarity with desperately vulnerable people living in the slums of India, but also to help Global Care keep saving lives.”
Global Care was set up in Coventry more than 35 years ago and is currently working in 17 countries across four continents. The charity aims to support the poorest and most vulnerable children, through education; vocational training, feeding and welfare care.
You can sign up for the Slum Supper Challenge at www.globalcare.org/slum-supper-challenge/
