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Pop star Pixie Lott recently made an inspiring visit to Lusaka, Zambia, to see how some of the money raised from this year’s Sport Relief campaign is already hard at work changing lives across Africa.
Back in March, Sport Relief 2012 raised a huge £67.9 million and, in response to the public’s generosity, the UK Government matched some of the money. As Pixie witnessed for herself, this money is already transforming the lives of people living in urban slums across the world’s second largest continent.
In Zambia one in four people are living in slums and there are very few job opportunities there. Pixie met a group of inspirational women who have joined forces to run small savings schemes with the help of a project supported by money raised through Sport Relief. The project has given the women access to small affordable loans which they have used to start their own businesses and break the cycle of poverty for a brighter, sustainable future for themselves and their families.
By creating a regular income, the women in the savings group can now afford to properly feed and clothe their families, and are able to send their children to school to get an education that will dramatically improve their life chances.
Speaking about her time in Zambia, Pixie said: “I was amazed at the huge transformation something as simple as a small loan can make to those living in poverty. I met one widow living with HIV called Veronica who was struggling to make ends meet, but after taking out a loan of just £6 she was able to buy some wool to start a clothes business. She now has two shops and earns enough money to do things which you and I would take for granted, like feeding her family, sending her children to school and building a safe home to live in with eight of her family away from the overcrowded, dirty conditions in the slum.”
