Coal for Christmas

This is everything you need to know about the Coal Project I am working on. I hope you'll join me in giving coal for Christmas and hope, dignity, lives, and jobs to Haiti!

The Coal Project (taken from Jody)

The first Adventure Project partnership is the charcoal-efficient stove program in Haiti.

Everyday 3 billion people worldwide are exposed to toxic smoke while preparing meals. Cooking on traditional stoves and open fires causes 1.9 million deaths every year. Especially children…who often lay tied to their mother’s backs for hours each day as she cooks. In fact, acute respiratory infection is the number one killer of childrenunder 5 in developing nations.

Traditional stoves and open fire cooking also increase deforestation and contribute to economic burden. Each year a family in the developing world uses 15 trees worth of firewood and charcoal. And in Haiti right now, families spend up 40% of their income on charcoal for cooking.

The solution is a locally made charcoal-efficient stove. The stove cuts the amount of charcoal needed in half, drastically reducing smoke emissions. It cooks food faster and at a higher temperature. Saving time and 20% of a families income and six tress per year.

This is Mary Ange who we met in a tent camp in Port Au Prince. She is saving the extra money from owning a stove to send her 7 year old to school.

Our short term goal is to help our local partner in Haiti be able to distribute an additional 2,000 stoves which will help 10,000 people this holiday. To do so, we need to put 2,000 lumps of coal in peoples stockings.

Our long term goal is to help our partner set up a stove production factory in Haiti so the stoves can be produced locally. Part of the money raised will go toward helping to set up the factory and train the workers. The design, production, testing, distribution and sale of the stoves will all be done locally...providing jobs and spurring economic growth.

And that is why we are so excited about The Coal Project. It is a venture that saves lives…but it also creates jobs.

And you can join us here.

(all photos by the amazing Esther Havens)