Spicma

16/09/2026

SPICMA helped recently to fund a major water supply project in Rubuguri, Uganda. Women and children in scattered communities across this hilly region had to negotiate steep descents to a far-off spring, then clamber back up again with full 25-kg jerrycans. This had to be done at least twice a day to ensure enough water for drinking, cooking, washing, crop irrigation, and their livestock.

We contributed £3,750 of the total cost of £15,000 and recently received a full report, including these photographs with captions that show the extent of the work and its happy outcome.

02/08/2026

Kyanamira Primary School, Uganda, serves the children of an impoverished community. Four of the classrooms had become dilapidated with age, unsafe, with no doors or windows, and a leaking roof. SPICMA sent just £6,800 and the building was transformed. Now, pupils who had stayed away because of the conditions are happy to come to classes and the school is thriving again.

01/07/2026

Our Lady of Trust Nursery and Primary School in Pakwach, Uganda, lies in the middle of a troubled region, beset for almost 40 years by rebel insurgencies that keep the mostly illiterate inhabitants in hand-to-mouth poverty. Nonetheless, the population is growing rapidly and the school has expanded from 100 to 380 pupils in the last three years.

Sanitation had lagged, however, so the Capuchin Friars who run the school asked SPICMA for £6,000 to build a new four-cubicle pit latrine. It replaces the crumbling two-cubicle facility which the children - and their teachers - have endured for many years.

As the photographs show, the friars did a good job and the new latrines have not only reduced the risk of disease, but have helped to improve school attendance. Our prayers and thanks go to our ever-generous benefactors.

14/06/2026

Wema Health Centre is in one of the poorest regions of Kenya. Droughts alternate with floods, making access extremely difficult. Among the worst affected are pregnant women, for whom birth complications can be fatal, with the nearest hospital over 100km away.
The Centre built a new maternity unit, but had no beds or equipment. SPICMA sent just £3000, but it was enough to buy the proper equipment, as well as beds, mattresses, and lockers. Now, Wema is the maternity referral centre for smaller dispensaries across the region. Neonatal and maternal deaths are greatly reduced, giving comfort, confidence, and joy to expectant mothers.

13/05/2026

Give a hungry family a loaf; they will eat for a day. Give them seeds, tools, and training; they will eat (and earn) indefinitely. That is SPICMA’s founding purpose.

Basankusu diocese, DRC, is an example. The people are mainly subsistence farmers, but grow the same crops as everyone else. In the oversupplied local market, that only makes them poorer. A high proportion of young men with little or no work means drink and drugs proliferate.

A year ago, Mill Hill Missionaries arranged some local youth into groups and taught them to grow other, more valuable, crops. Although that initiative is doing well, productivity is low, so the priests asked us to help them buy tools and other equipment.

We sent £2.750 and they bought tools, seeds, buckets, and other essentials. Their report included photographs of these being delivered and put to use - please indulge our little joke in the captions. This group has some 40 members who have cleared fields, planted beans, and begun cultivation. Crops are sprouting, new skills are being learned, family income and food security are improving, and delinquency is receding. https://spicma.org/donate/

06/05/2026

Famine and widening food insecurity are inevitable consequences of US military aggression against Iran. That ought to weigh heavily on the conscience of a world that understands this war mostly in terms of oil prices.

The real issue has been identified by the UN World Food Programme, which estimates an additional 45 million people will be pushed into acute hunger as a result of the war, with about two-thirds of these living in Africa.

Rising Food Crisis: Nigeria Among Top 10 Nations Facing Severe Hunger Crisis

16/04/2026

Sudan is the world’s biggest humanitarian disaster. Some two-thirds of its 50m people need help, of whom one-third is homeless, and an entire generation is being robbed of education. Famine is spreading fast, especially in Darfur, stronghold of Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the rebel group fighting Sudan's armed forces. The UN says the ensuing atrocities “bear the hallmarks of genocide”. Please pray for the innocent victims of Sudan's civil war.

02/04/2026

Anai Primary School, Uganda, has about 1,400 pupils. One of the older classroom blocks had fallen into dangerous disrepair - leaking roof, broken windows and doors. It also had a dust floor, harbouring jiggers (burrowing fleas). Both teachers and pupils found it distressing and studies suffered.

SPICMA sent £7,900 for a new block and received recently a full report from Fr Isaac Ojuk, parish priest. He said the new block had not only boosted both teaching and learning performance, but had enhanced the community’s trust and sense of ownership in the school.

As ever, thanks and prayers go to our benefactors who make such results possible, helping to transform prospects for some of the most forgotten, deprived, and overlooked communities in the developing world. www.spicma.org