by Jonathan Reckford
Habitat for Humanity recently entered its fourth decade serving low-income families around the world, and we have never been more committed to expanding our capacity to do more. Nowhere is the need more severe than in Africa, where, like so many of their counterparts in other parts of the world, families live burdened in scrap-metal lean-tos in sprawling city slums or on the wide-open rural plains.
Habitat has a long and rich history in Africa, and as you'll read in this edition of Habitat World, we are seeking new ways of responding to the vast need on that continent, so severely plagued by HIV/AIDS and war and by a poverty rate that in some locations tightly grips more than 70 percent of the population.
Because the housing need is so vast--in Africa and elsewhere--we have to explore creative means of meeting it. We have to identify new revenue streams, cultivate new partnerships, use our imagination, our creativity, while continuing to honor the values that shape us.
In Rwanda, for example, we have partnered with World Relief and the country's leading sustainable microfinance institution URWEGO to provide micro-credit and decent housing for very poor, mostly women-headed households. These families have been receiving manageable income-generating micro loans and now wish to add a housing component to the equation. Through the World Relief-URWEGO partnership, Habitat for Humanity is there to assist. We have to apply that same innovation to other areas, as well.
Beginning on page 11, profiles collectively called "Adding It Up" illustrate some of the novel ways individuals and groups are raising funds to foster Habitat's work across the globe. From triathlons in Michigan to auto racing in South Carolina, people are increasing the resources available to us--and that, like raising public awareness or serving on affiliate committees or advocating for affordable housing locally, helps fulfill our mission every bit as much as hammering nails or laying concrete block.
Not long after I came on board with Habitat I traveled to Africa and in Ghana saw the transformation that decent housing can bring. I met Bernard Botwe and his wife Joanna, who, along with their children Harry and Gifty, were the first Habitat homeowners in Ghana. Today, nearly two decades after their humble beginnings in a modest, solid Habitat home, the family is thriving. Bernard is a hospital administrator and continues to move upward in his career.
He said, "The Habitat home changed our lives." It was a joy to see evidence of that, and it's a privilege to work with people so devoted to making more families part of the solution-across Africa and around the world.
Thank you for joining us on that journey.
Jonathan T.M. Reckford
Chief Executive Officer, Habitat for Humanity International
