About

U_Girl with babyFriends of Mulanje Orphans ( FOMO )

FOMO was established in 2000 to aid Orphans in Mulanje, a district of Malawi, Africa. The seeds of the idea for the formation of FOMO stemmed from the many harrowing stories relayed back to Mary Woodworth from her friends and relatives still living in her home village in Mulanje. During a visit early in 2000, Mary and Keith were able to see and hear of the desperate plight of many of the local Children.

Determined to make the idea of FOMO a reality, Mary contacted relatives and friends who over the years had been helping many orphaned children. From this small beginning FOMO became a reality and aims to provide and enhance the health, education, food security, meet the basic human needs and develop the potential of all the needy and orphaned children of Mulanje.

The sad reality is that there are too many children in need of help and too few local families that can afford to help. Though there are many high profile agencies within Malawi they seem unable to address the immediate, local, one to one help, that FOMO is committed to provide.

From small beginnings FOMO has grown and now looks after many thousands of children through a network of 14 centres covering over 90 villages in Mulanje district of Malawi.

FOMO is seen as a success by the children, local committees and officers, (DC, TA’s, Police, heath workers, social services etc), FOMO works by assisting and working with the communities using the traditional values and structures that have served the population in what can only be describes as better time.

FOMO in the UK is run by a small board of trustees whose main work is to raise funds and awareness of the children’s situation. Additionally the FOMO UK is responsible for controlling these funds, identifying and facilitating the needs of FOMO Mulanje.

FOMO Mulanje’s day to day activities are run by a small number of employees, project officer, accountant, playschool teacher, matron plus local volunteers, that help out with the general day to day functions, cooking, sport, gardening club, bees, chickens, choir etc. Each of the 14 centers has a locally elected volunteer committee who are responsible for the day to day running of their centre and they are also responsible for identifying and assessing children in need.

The bridge between FOMO UK and FOMO Mulanje is mainly through our founder Mary, who is in a special position in that she understands Malawi, speaks the language, has a clear view of the injustices and knows how to motivate the local population, and generally is an inspiration and example to us all.116a

With an eye on the future FOMO, run 14 playschools, secondary school,(FISS)  and a tailoring school/outlet. We, when funds are available, sponsor further education for the volunteers and children

I wish to donate to FOMO’s work to help the children Click Here