Raising the Breadline on Mandela Day
The Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, together with Breadline Africa, one of the biggest suppliers of converted containers for poverty relief in Southern Africa, will together with a number of corporate sponsors, place twenty container libraries in schools across the country this year. The campaign will form part of the international Nelson Mandela Day celebrations, which begin on 18 July 2012.
The disused shipping containers have been renovated by Breadline Africa and recycled into libraries. Over the next few months they will be placed in some of the most poverty stricken areas. The schools, which were identified by Soul City, an institute for health and development communication, will be placed in areas where basic access to facilities and qualified teachers is limited.
“Literacy and the right to education is a human right,” Director of Breadline Africa, Tim Smith said. “We are delighted to be working with the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory to ensure the roll-out of the container libraries and we encourage everyone to get involved in whatever capacity they can offer. We hope to expand this programme in the future, this will be entirely dependent on public support and finance.”
The libraries will be placed in junior schools; “Every school should have access to a library and every child should be able to read, write and be given the means to learn; sadly this is not the case in many schools across the country. The library container initiative needs the support of the general public and corporates. We encourage everyone to get involved and help in some way on Mandela Day,” Smith said.