Skip links


Meru Women’s Garden Project Selected as the SIGBI Project 2016-2019

Seven members from SI Canterbury attended the glittering 2015 SIGBI Conference at the Clyde Auditorium of the SECC Glasgow. It was a roller coaster event for our club which started with our president-elect and club presenter, Yvonne Freeman, being introduced to Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal who was addressing conference.

We enjoyed three days of friendship, entertainment and inspiring talks by the keynote speakers. We also heard from many of our  Soroptimist sisters from around the world, who are working on amazing Programme Action projects to ‘deliver the difference’.

However, the highlight for SI Canterbury was when our bid proposal was selected for the SIGBI Federation Project 2016-2019.

Club presenters Carol Townsend, Yvonne Freeman and Martina Gant (International Programme Director of Child.org) conquered their nerves to deliver an excellent presentation outlining the Meru Women’s Garden Project, and our belief that it can truly ‘deliver the difference’ to women and children in Meru, one of the poorest regions of rural Kenya.

We have been working on this proposal since early 2015 and for a small club, it has been hard but rewarding work.

After many weeks preparing the bid with our partner charity, we were delighted when our project was shortlisted. Work then began on composing a summary of the bid which was  distributed to all clubs within SIGBI in early September.

Finally we prepared a presentation and slideshow for conference, using many of the photographs taken by Martina during a recent trip to Meru to visit some of the current women’s groups. By the time we arrived in Glasgow we were excited, nervous and tired, but we were delighted and proud when SI Canterbury’s bid was selected with a majority vote.

The hard work will continue as SI Canterbury begins work with SIGBI and Child.org to launch the project to all clubs in the SIGBI Federation on 8th March 2016 – International Women’s Day.

 

To view our slideshow presented at conference please follow the link:

SI Canterbury -The Meru Women’s Garden Project (PDF)

For more information on the Meru Women’s Garden project please follow the link below:

Meru Women’s Garden Project – SI Canterbury

www.child.org/what-we-do/empowering-women-community

Margaret Ikiara – CIFORD http://www.fiohnetwork.org/testimonies/margarettest.htm