Reaching out to the community

Amaoti in Inanda is one of the poorest communities on our doorstep ... a community hard hit by the AIDS pandemic, which has robbed a generation of children of their parents, and shifted the burden of child care onto the frail shoulders of elderly grandparents.

TAFTA's response was to create a unique devlopment project – the Ilungelo Labadala Multi-purpose Centre, comprising a hall, training centre, kitchen block, shops, toilets, and four cottages providing subsidised accommodation to the aged and their orphaned grandchildren.

The Centre includes a pension pay-out point which operates three days a month and serves over two thousand pensioners in the district. There is also a Service Centre operating two to three mornings a week, providing exercise classes, fellowship meetings, literacy classes and meals for pensioners and children.

More recently, we have added a Home Based Care programme and a Food Gardening Project. Ten trained caregivers currently visit 40 house-bound elderly and ill patients to assist with problems such as stroke, epilepsy, high blood pressure and diabetes.

With the help of local farmers, a one-hectare plot was fenced and an irrigation system installed to start the food gardening project. The first group of 14 eager gardeners was trained and a second group are currently being enrolled. Production has fluctuated, but lessons have been learned and the project looks set to go from strength to strength.

For more information, contact Theresa Mwandla, the Community Development Manager on tel.
031 518-7989 or 031 332-3721.