Self Help Africa

Self Help Africa is an international charity that promotes and implements long-term rural development projects in Africa. Self Help Africa merged with Gorta, in July 2014, and was known for a period as Gorta-Self Help Africa. In 2021, the organisation merged with the UK-based international non-governmental organization (INGO), United Purpose. Self Help Africa also owns a number of social enterprise subsidiaries - Cumo Microfinance, TruTrade and Partner Africa.

The charity works with rural communities in fifteen African countries – supporting farm families to grow more and earn more from their produce. Self Help Africa provides training and technical support to assist households to produce more food, diversify their crops and incomes, and access markets for their surplus produce.

The charity, which has also undertaken development projects in Bangladesh and Brazil, also helps rural communities to access micro-finance services, and supports sustainable agricultural solutions that enable rural farmers to adapt and mitigate the effects of climate change. Self Help Africa works with local partners across its African programmes to support the provision of good quality local seed and planting materials. This work includes assistance to local communities to multiply their own seed, and provision of support for rural groups so that they can get certification for the seed that they produce.

Self Help Africa has its headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, UK offices in Shrewsbury, Belfast, London and American offices in New York and Boston. It is a recipient of funding from Irish Aid, the European Commission, US AID, the United Kingdom Department of Foreign and Overseas Development (DFID), of variety of trusts, foundations, other institutional donors, and the general public. It has three subsidiary companies, an ethical auditing provider, and two trade network promoters. Provided by Wikipedia