Mary’s Meals launches emergency appeal as millions of hungry children close to ‘catastrophe’ in Southern Africa

The Scotland-based charity is calling for urgent help in response to the worst drought in 100 years after six countries declare state of emergency

Mary’s Meals has launched an emergency appeal to feed millions of hungry children who are close to ‘catastrophe’ in Southern Africa.

An estimated 21 million children across the region are currently malnourished after the worst drought in the last 100 years led to a third successive poor harvest in 2024. Six countries have declared a state of emergency, and the UN has called for action to avoid a full-scale humanitarian disaster (1).

Mary’s Meals is currently providing a lifeline to families in Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe, four of the worst-affected countries in the region, by serving nutritious meals to around 1.5 million children.

However, the Scotland-based international school feeding charity is calling for urgent help to expand its feeding programme and reach more hungry children with a meal in school, like Amoss, a pupil at Dzunga School in Malawi. The 15-year-old says: “I worry about food all the time. I can’t learn without eating. You can’t do anything when you are hungry.”

Even the most recent planting season has been a disaster with rains arriving several months late, leaving precious seeds to wither and die. As a result, the forthcoming harvest is also expected to be very poor. Although there was some rain at the end of January, the growing season is now truncated and there is not enough time for crops to thrive.

Angela Chipeta-Khonje, Country Director for Mary’s Meals Malawi, explains: “Crops have been wiped out across the region, leaving people hungry long before the usual ‘lean’ months. The impact of the drought on food security is severe in a region where 70 per cent of smallholder farmers rely on rain-fed agriculture for their livelihood.

“We estimate that in Malawi alone, 5.7 million people are in food crisis. We provide a daily meal in school to more than one million of the most vulnerable children, giving them and their families the reassurance of accessing one vital meal a day. But we need to do more, and we need to act fast before this situation becomes a catastrophe.”

Mary’s Meals, which started in the Scottish Highlands 23 years ago and still retains its global headquarters in the village of Dalmally, feeds more than 2.4 million hungry children every school day in 16 of the world’s poorest countries. The meals encourage children – who may have been working in the fields or begging on street corners – into the classroom and give them energy to learn. This means, even in this most difficult of times, these children can make the most of their education and help break the generational cycle of poverty.

Angela Chipeta-Khonje continues: “Education is vital to the social and economic development of countries like Malawi. We need a well-educated population in order to develop. By offering a daily meal in a place of education, we are not just ensuring the children access vital nutrition, but we are encouraging them to learn. Learning on an empty stomach is almost impossible.”

The Mary’s Meals story began in 2002 when founder Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow visited Malawi during a famine and met a mother, Emma, dying from AIDS. When Magnus asked her eldest son, Edward, what his dreams were in life, he replied simply: “I want to have enough food to eat and to go to school one day.”

Today, Magnus is calling for people across the UK to help the charity feed desperate children in Malawi and throughout Southern Africa. Magnus says: “We need to expand school feeding as fast as possible into areas of acute need across Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique. Our programme is owned by and embedded in local communities, equipping them to provide vital school meals for their children in an effective and sustainable way.

“We know school feeding works and we know our programme is scalable. With your urgent help, we can work quickly to reach many thousands more vulnerable children with much-needed meals while they learn.”

Thanks to our low-cost approach it costs just 10p a day to feed a child with Mary’s Meals. With your support we can help more children and families through this devastating drought. Please donate today.

For more information, visit marysmeals.org.uk/southern-africa