• Other Global Locations
  • Search
Host an Event
Donate

Jamesly is Growing Opportunities for His Community’s Future

on  March 14, 2022

Living in a supportive community in the Artibonite department of Haiti, 22-year-old Jamesly wants to give back and support others there by becoming an agricultural technician.Jamesly’s community is in a rural area with inadequate roads, limited access to electricity and high unemployment rates. This can make nutritious food hard to come by for many in the community. Jamesly often found it difficult to find food to eat and felt weak.Through the agriculture training program he attends, he began receiving Rise Against Hunger meals distributed by partner Salesian Missions. He now has plenty of energy to study in the program. “By eating a hot dish, I have the strength to work for a whole day,” said Jamesly.Louis, the director of the agricultural technical school and Jamesly’s mentor, has noticed how Jamesly has changed since the nutritious Rise Against Hunger meals began to be distributed at the center. Louis said, “He is a hard-working student who sets clear goals and does what it takes to achieve them… Jamesly has become more enthusiastic in his studies and his work in the fields. I am proud of him because I feel that he is gradually being built and is preparing to invest in the construction of his country and his locality.”Lephene, Director of Salesian Missions, said that when the young people arrive at the center for the program, “they can find a hot dish and it suits them a lot, encourages them to work in their learning and they can return to their family in the afternoon without too much difficulty. Sometimes it is the only dish that they receive during the day. This means that this food is extremely important for their physical development.”Jamesly is set to complete the agricultural training program in three years, and he wants to then utilize his skills and knowledge to help his community and country produce more food. With a goal to become an agricultural technician, he plans to create a farm with a chicken coop to give people in the area access to types of nutritious food that are typically hard to come by.The preparation for Jamesly’s future starts with a meal. It will lead to him serving and empowering his community. Join our It Starts With a Meal movement to support futures for people like Jamesly around the world!

About the Author

Strength, Stability And Hope

The gift that filled Nelly’s table.

“We were yielding very little, and the crops could not sustain us the whole year,” Nelly remembers. As a mother of seven and a farmer with two decades of experience, the stress of inconsistent yields was all-consuming. A poor harvest not only strained her family financially, but also limited their own meals to just two a day. Their story reflects that of many in their fishing and farming village near a lake in the Karonga district of northern Malawi. Here, heavy rainfall makes conventional farming methods nearly impossible. The entire village is, quite literally, saturated in food insecurity — a reality that leaves families struggling to survive season after season without a dependable source of nourishment.

In 2019, Nelly began participating in Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience, a sustainable agriculture project implemented by Rise Against Hunger in partnership with the Foundation for Community Support Services (FOCUS). The project works with 3,100 smallholder farmers in Malawi’s Karonga and Mzimba districts to strengthen food and nutrition security by improving production methods, nutrition practices and household income.

Just one year later, Nelly was ready to expand the variety of crops on her farm. What land once only produced maize began to flourish with sesame, cowpeas, rice and groundnuts during the rainy season (summer), as well as maize and vegetables during the dry season (winter). Through climate-smart agriculture training, she learned new techniques like manure making, pit planting and mulching, crop rotation and intercropping. Equipped with these tools, Nelly’s farm began to thrive.

After the 2023–2024 growing season, she sold enough produce to purchase an ox cart. Her harvests in 2024-2025 season yielded over 500 pounds of crops, including 22 bags of groundnuts, seven bags of maize, 12 tins of sesame and three bags of rice. With this surplus, she was able to invest in a motorbike, which she now uses to transport African doughnuts (mandasi) that she cooks and sells — creating yet another source of income for her family.

The transformation reaches far beyond her finances. Nelly now has the stability to provide for her husband and children. “I am able to eat different food types, pay school fees for my children and fulfill the visions that I have made with my family,” she beams. “I am now sleeping peacefully without any fears of food or paying school fees for the children.”

Her leadership has also grown. Today, Nelly serves as a leader in the Harvesting Prosperity and Resilience project, teaching other farmers in her district to adopt climate-resilient, labor-saving practices. By sharing her knowledge, she is multiplying her impact — empowering her neighbors to experience the same transformation she has achieved.

Across Nelly’s community, food and economic security are on the rise. Lombani, a government extension officer for the region, explains, “I can see the community is being transformed in the sense that in the area, there is food, income and nutrition security. Development is also happening at the household level.”

Nelly reflects on what it means to invest in holistic programs that address the root causes of hunger: “We are now healthy people. Children are going to school after eating their breakfast, having high yields and different types of crops due to conservation agriculture practices. With the support from the project, we have food, and we can access other food items from the market after selling our produce.”

This is the gift that fills: a future full of stability, strength and hope. It fills tables with food, families with security and communities with the resources to thrive. It’s an investment in futures rooted in resilience and hope.