ActionAid has been working in Zambia since 2006. Our current areas of focus are health, water, livelihoods and education.

Poverty is a major problem in Zambia, with seventy three per cent of the population living below the poverty line. Zambia also has the seventh highest level of adults living with HIV in the world. An acute lack of health services, schools and clean water are some of the other challenges facing the Zambian people.

Child sponsorship in Zambia

Lilian (pictured right with Mary, her mother) has lived with uncertainty about her future. Her mother has needed to struggle to keep her land so she can make a living and support her family. With support from ActionAid partner Land Alliance, after two years of making every effort, she has her own plot.

Land security means food security, and that means that Lilian can study and learn for a better future, instead of struggling against hunger.

ActionAid child sponsorship works with local people to fund the projects that will make a real long term difference to a child, a community and the whole country.

• Sponsor a child in Zambia

Health and education in Zambia

Zambia’s child mortality rates are amongst the highest in the world with children at risk from diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis. HIV/AIDS is also a major cause of child mortality. It is this pandemic that has caused national life expectancy to drop from 50 to 42 years and left over 600,000 children orphaned. There is a dire lack of hospitals and trained medical workers in the country – with a doctor-to-patient ratio of just one to 8300, compared with one to 600 in the UK.

ActionAid is training people in rural Zambia to give basic medical help and teach their communities how to prevent common illnesses. We are also working to support women with HIV and AIDS who are often cut off from their communities because of their illness. Since 2006, life expectancy has risen to 46 years, and is continuing to improve.

Many families in Zambia cannot afford to give their children an education and even if they could, there is a great shortage of schools. ActionAid is working to make education accessible to poor communities: holding meetings with local leaders to promote the importance of education for girls and campaigning for more schools and teachers. We also promote adult literacy with our Reflect programme.

How you can help

When you sponsor a child in Zambia, you'll be providing the resources for real, long-term change. You'll get two letters a year from the child you sponsor, and updates from the country programme to tell you how the money you are spending is changing the community your child lives in.

• Sponsor a child in Zambia