Friday 4th October was our CAFOD Harvest Fast Day with the focus being on people accessing training for trades to support themselves and their families. This year as well as collecting through our envelopes we partnered with TWAM (Tools with a Mission) and held a HARVEST of TOOLS which continued over the following week
TWAM is a Christian charity that collects unwanted usabletools, refurbishes them, sorts them into trade tool kits and sends them to the developing world for livelihood creation. They send to six partner countries in Sub-Saharan Africa: Zambia, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Malawi, and DR Congo. Their primary beneficiaries are vulnerable individuals such as single mothers, school dropouts, street orphans, homeless people, people with physical disabilities, and ex-sex workers.
The following is a report from Frances (our CAFOD co-ordinator)
This is a belated update on the Harvest of Tools which was so well supported. I had hoped for some pictures of the collection all sorted out but they haven’t arrived.
The initial contact wanted to collect the items over a number of weeks as the main van would not be in this region for over a month. This seemed impractical considering the amount of tools donated and we discussed hiring a van to make one journey as that would be more cost effective both financially and time wise. However after some exchange of ideas and a few phone calls another TWAM supporter volunteered to collect the tools the following day.
Everything then happened very quickly. Having rashly agreed to a next day collection my concern then was opening the church and thankfully Michael Neild came to the rescue which meant the operation went smoothly. The TWAM volunteer arrived in a van with a trailer both of which were filled and after some heavy weight lifting and quite a bit of panting he told me that this was the largest collection of tools he had ever collected. As well as an abundance of gardening and trade tools there was a good collection of fabric, sewing machines, buttons, zips, ribbon and some lovely brand new secateurs and work gloves.
Tools packed in the van ready to go!
Thank you all so much for your enthusiastic and generous support of this initiative and I hope you can all enjoy the space you have created in your sheds, under the stairs or behind the settees
– let’s hope you don’t need that spanner, screw driver or button soon!
