Help North American Conference on Ethiopian Jewry to Feed Children

For Five days each week in Gondar Province, Ethiopia, and six days in Addis Ababa, 5,000 Ethiopian Jewish children receive one nourishing meal as part of the daily school programs operated by the North American Conference on Ethiopian Jewry (NACOEJ). Thanks to an unusual Sponsorship Program, their bodies, as well as their minds, are being fed and nurtured while they wait to go to Israel.

This life-sustaining effort was launched when some children attending the NACOEJ school in Addis Ababa were fainting during the school day. The school staff realized that the children were seriously malnourished. One child who had fainted had not eaten in two days.

The Sponsorship Program allows American sponsors to provide a desperately needed healthy meal for each of the thousands of children who attend school at the NACOEJ compounds in Addis Ababa and Gondar. Before the current food shortage, the meals cost approximately 15 cents a day -a total of $39 a year. Today, due to the drought and famine in many parts of Ethiopia, the cost of food has skyrocketed-up to 25% and still climbing. As a result, meals now cost 17 cents a day and a Sponsorship now comes to $53-still an incredibly small amount to feed a child for a year.

The children's meals typically include an egg, a potato, a vegetable and a fruit, accompanied by iodized salt. The nutritive value is very high, and helps to protect the children's immune systems which, when weakened by malnutrition, leave them vulnerable to illness and even death from diseases like measles.

For more information contact:
American Jewish Commitee
212-751-4000 (New York, USA)

Return to News Archives Back to Top