These are some challenging times we’re all living in. 2020 certainly hasn’t gone according to our plans, and I’ll bet that it hasn’t been what you thought either.

We rescheduled our April trip to Zambia for next month, only to cancel that one after Zambia suspended issuing all tourist visas (and COVID-19 didn’t really quit). We had to postpone our entrepreneurship group meetings and delay the issuance of our business grants as the main focus of Phase 2.

Instead we’re holding weekly food distributions for our women. Around 15 women, past students and graduates of ours, come to our Chikondi Community Center and take a socially-distanced seat with their homemade chitenge masks on. Tresa, Martha, and Charity lead the group with some encouragement, time for sharing, and then hand out the bundle of groceries.

The weekly staples are Mealie Meal (local staple food made of ground maize), soya pieces (think dried tofu), rice, dried beans, cooking oil, and soap. Some weeks have added/changed items based on market availability. On the menu for this week: vinkubala. Vinkubala is the Nyanja word for dried caterpillars, an enjoyed side item with nshima (made from Mealie Meal). Vinkubala can be boiled or fried. Here’s a photo of them from the market:

When I first had the idea of Clothed in Hope 10 years ago, food distributions definitely weren’t part of the plan. We have seen too many times when these well-intentioned actions actually create a harmful dependence in communities. Plus, the majority of the women we were looking to work with said themselves that they want to be EMPOWERED to know a skill, run a business, and feed their families. They weren’t eating 3 meals a day, but they were all still eating 1-2 meals a day. But all that changed when the economic effects of COVID-19 hit Zambia during an already vulnerable time.

So how could we still make much-needed food distributions as a tool of empowerment?

Only the women/moms come to pick up unprepared food. We don’t cook large quantities and ask people to come to us. We give the women the tools (food) they need to prepare in their homes. Their children don’t have to know that they got it from an organization. They can still see their mothers as food providers as they’ve always been. The family can still be together in the home unit for meals.
Our Zambia staff is running the distributions. They locally source the food items to support local businesses to further the local economy as much as possible. Our staff has thanked us for getting to be a part of helping these women in such a tangible way. Most of our staff remember all too well what it was like to wonder where the next meal would come from, and they, too, are empowered to change their communities from the inside out.

We don’t see food distributions lasting forever. We hope they won’t be needed for many more months, if at all possible. Our staff continues to assess the individual situations of our ladies. Our next step will be to shift back to the Phase 2 model of business grants and investing deeply in our entrepreneurs. We hope to do that soon and will keep you posted.

Until then, we’ll keep on keepin’ on! THANK YOU so much to all of you who have given so generously and kindly over these past weeks and months. Thanks to YOU, we’ve been able to provide food for 195 people! Enjoy this joyful video of Ngoza celebrating when it was her turn to receive food. It’s the best!

Thank you for choosing to love big and give HOPE as we continue empowering women in Zambia. It may be a little different right now, but there’s still joy and hope here!

With Chikondi (Love),
Amy