We’re going to answer every question today with “tomato”, because it’s gotten so tomato-y that we’ve forgotten everything else today. The garden in Burkina Faso, which is tended with such care by our charges, using the water and tools that you provide them with, has just flourished! We are harvesting tomatoes and effortlessly selling any amount of them. Because they are BIO, because they are tasty, because they are the best in the whole area.

It is difficult to describe the joy of the families of Gourcy, who only a few years ago were faced with a dramatic decision. They were considering fleeing the country and facing the mortal danger of trekking across the Sahara and crossing the Mediterranean. At the other extreme was hunger, which would no longer allow them to live here, where their home, field, family, language, culture and traditions were. But hunger could not be a choice. It never is. If you had not created opportunities for them to work and earn, they would certainly have fled their homes.

They are joyful, they have plans, they want to grow. They are happy that they can give a sense of security to their families. Their children are going to school soon. And we follow one step behind them, because we know that our charges need us very much before the first school bell rings.

Let’s provide them with school supplies. Not luxurious sets of crayons in hundreds of shades, but the simplest backpack, a few pencils, a notebook – all the things you can’t start school without. Let’s put the wind back in their sails again, so that high price rises don’t force anyone to have to decide whether their child will go to school or not.