A message from our CEO

At Project Harar we envision a world where every child, no matter where they are in the world, has access to the health care services they need. 

We focus on targeted, measurable and sustainable changes that work towards global goals around health care and inclusion. 

The Covid-19 pandemic has shed a stark spotlight on the health inequalities that exist in every corner of the world. As we continue to see the virus disproportionally impact the most vulnerable, working together to remove barriers to health care and to share knowledge, skills and resources is more important than ever.

By supporting Project Harar, you are actively working towards a world that does not discriminate. Project Harar exists to overcome barriers to essential health care services — such as treatment for cleft lip and palate. We are committed to helping implement sustainable change in existing health infrastructures, through the means of collaboration, listening and responding to need. 

As we constantly address new challenges in our work, I would like to thank and highlight the incredible achievements of the team this year, both in Ethiopia and in the UK. I am grateful for working with Amanuel Tafese, Project Harar Ethiopia's Executive Director and Country Head.

This year Project Harar has provided access to cleft treatment for 516 infants and young children from across Ethiopia. I continue to be inspired by the stories of the families who access our services. Every month we meet families who have been completely isolated from their communities, afraid to join in with their local faith group and their children denied their place at school due to stigma around cleft lip and palate in rural areas. But when families do access Project Harar's services, they tell us that when they go back home to their community, they will work to spread the word to other families that there is hope and that treatment is available. 

I want to highlight the profound difference your support makes to the families who access our services. By helping infants access surgery for cleft lip and palate at an early age you are giving them a significantly improved chance of a better life, enabling them to rejoin their community, to make friends — perhaps for the first time — and to go to school. 

Our team have been increasingly working with local and regional media outlets to spread the word about Project Harar's services. We continue to be agile in responding to the constantly changing environment in Ethiopia, for example to the insecure food environment in many rural areas. Our targeted nutritional support initiative provides nutrition packages for children who are not healthy enough to receive safe cleft surgery, providing them with enriched products such as milk powder and peanut butter that will encourage healthy weight gain.  

In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic we have come a long way this year in adapting our complex surgical programme. Throughout 2021 we continued to collaborate with Yekatit-12 Government Hospital Addis Ababa; throughout the year Project Harar and Yekatit-12 joined together with UCL Head and Neck Academic Centre, to produce a series of online lectures. The lectures were targeted at medical professionals globally, presenting topics relating to Head and Neck. Towards the end of October 2021, we were successful in receiving a global health partnership grant from THET (Tropical Health Education Trust), to support a virtual volunteering programme between Project Harar and Yekatit-12. Thank you to Professor Mekonen and everyone who helps to make this work possible at Yekaiti-12, along with Project Harar's excellent medical volunteers, who despite dealing with a global health crisis continue to share their skills and support Project Harar's collaboration work.

We have much to be thankful for; our partners, trusts and foundations who continue to support us, volunteers who give up their time and our Trustees, Ambassadors and Patrons. The fundraising environment surrounding our work continues to be tough, I want to acknowledge every single person who has supported our work during this time. As a result of your kindness many young lives have changed and will continue to change for the better. 

— Jackie Riley, Project Harar CEO