After 20 years of working in Eswatini, our answer is yes, and we see the proof at Project Canaan, where more than 450 people now have steady work. A job brings in an income, and an income is what lets a family plan: for next week’s food, for next term’s school costs, and for the years ahead.
Every year on October 17, the United Nations marks the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. Food, healthcare, and education all belong in that conversation, and so does the thing that helps a family keep all three going. At Heart for Africa (Canada), we’ve built much of our work around it.
Why Steady Work Is So Hard to Find in Eswatini
Eswatini is a small kingdom in southern Africa, and the World Bank reports that 54% of its people live below the lower-middle-income poverty line of $4.20 a day. In the rural communities around Project Canaan, our team’s on-the-ground experience is that closer to 70% of working-age adults have no steady job. Many families piece together an income from small, irregular work, and many people leave home to look for work elsewhere.
What One Pay Cheque Does for a Family
More than 450 people work at Project Canaan, and on average each of them supports seven family members at home. That puts more than 3,000 people in households that are steadier because someone in the family has a job here.
A wage covers the things a family plans around: food on the table, school costs, medical visits, and electricity at home. It also gives children something harder to measure. When a parent heads to work each morning and comes home with a pay cheque, the next generation grows up with a picture of what’s possible, and that hope is something we see across the community we serve.
Jobs for Every Kind of Skill
The work at Project Canaan reaches across the whole community. People build, grow, teach, and care as welders and mechanics, in our greenhouses and egg barns, and as teachers, nurses, cooks, and aunties and uncles to the children in our care. Our 1,000-hectare farm does double duty: it grows food that reaches 31 communities each month, and it’s a workplace for hundreds of local families.
Keeping the Money Local
Where we spend matters as much as who we hire. We buy supplies locally wherever we can, so every wage and every purchase keeps moving through the Eswatini economy, from the shops where staff families buy groceries to the local businesses that supply the village.
Preparing the Next Generation for Work
The children growing up at Project Canaan are part of this story too. Our older children are already dreaming and talking about what they want to do and who they want to be when they grow up. For some, that might mean receiving training in welding, woodworking, auto mechanics, and electrical work, so they can step into skilled jobs in their own country and carry the same steadiness into the next generation of Eswatini families.
Giving That Keeps People Working
A gift to our general fund supports the whole community where our mission is based at once: the homes, the school, the farm, and the hundreds of people who work in them. When you give to Heart for Africa (Canada), you’re helping children in our care and helping the families around them build something steady – something that they can rely on, along with hope for their futures.
If you’d like to be part of creating steady work and igniting hope in Eswatini, you can give to our general fund by clicking below.