Kids Reaching Kids in Africa Raises Record Amount
Children's Ministries collected its largest amount ever this year for the Vacation Bible School Mission Offering. The 2006 project that drew the outstanding collection was its kids reaching AIDS orphans project in Africa.
Action Africa: Giving Hope to AIDS Orphans, the 2006 Kids Reaching Kids project, raised $336,044, which was a 28 percent increase over last year's project - Mission H2O!
With approximately 13 million children in Africa under the age of 15 orphaned by the AIDS epidemic, many kids are left to care for themselves and other orphans affected by the disease. Many times, the oldest sibling who may still be a teen gives up school to take care of the rest of the family.
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Through Africa Action, kids participated this year by giving their coins and dollars at VBS. Collections to the VBS Mission Offering Project were directed to help African children receive basic training on farming skills, such as planting vegetable gardens and raising livestock, so they can care for themselves and others.
In the past two years, the Kids Reaching Kids network has generated more than a half million dollars to benefit kids.
Meanwhile, the number of AIDS orphans is expected to exceed 40 million by 2010. Today, Zimbabwe has the world's highest percentage of children orphaned by AIDS with almost one in every four children having lost at least one parent to the disease, the United Nations Children's Fund reported last week.
HIV infection rate declined in the southern African nation from 25 percent five years ago to 18.1 percent. Despite this, UNICEF said the number of children orphaned by AIDS continued to rise.
