LADIES LUNCH in aid of HAITI EARTHQUAKE SURVIVORS

Friday 19th of March

Royal Irish Yacht Club in Dun Laoghaire

Reception at 12.30 and lunch to follow at 1.30pm sharp

Cost €100.00

You will no doubt all have been shocked by the devastation in Haiti from the Earthquake last week. It is now feared that the death toll will be over 200,000, with a further 250,000 injured and over a million people displaced from their homes.

Some of you may know that I am involved with a charity called Seachange, which works with some of the poorest people on the planet helping them and their families to come out extreme poverty through Microcredit.

Microcredit is about giving tiny loans to help the poorest women to set up their own small business that allows them to feed and educate their children. It gives them a leg up and not a hand out which allows them to retain their dignity and self-respect. These mothers are no different to any others in the world and just want the very best for their children but in Haiti that is about food first and then a basic education, things that we here where we take for granted.

Since 2006 Seachange has been in partnership with Fonkoze, who are acknowledged as the most innovative and successful Microfinance institutions in the world, with their only motivation to help the poorest and not maximising profit.

We have visited Haiti a number of times over the last 4 years and have been inspired by what they have achieved in a country which is the poorest in the western hemisphere, with over 70% of the population living on less than 2 dollars a day.

The expression a ‘Hell called Haiti’ has always been a fair description of the awfulness of life due to the extreme poverty, violence, poor leadership, no infrastructure, and little hope, and that was before the earthquake. Now is an opportunity for all of us to help to rebuild Haiti and it will be the Fonkoze’s and their 750 staff that will help rebuild their shattered lives in the months and years ahead.

I am asking you to help those who have no voice –The Poorest of the Poor by supporting this lunch.

Contact Kate Dobbyn at 086-2585148 to reserve your place.