Mary’s Meals is a simple, global movement that works. We provide one daily meal in a place of learning to bring children from vulnerable communities into the classroom, where they receive an education that can, in the future, be their ladder out of poverty.

Mary’s Meals was born in 2002 when Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, from Scotland, visited Malawi during a famine and met a mother dying from AIDS. When Magnus asked her eldest son Edward what his dreams were in life, he replied simply: “I want to have enough food to eat and to be able to go to school one day.”

Mary’s Meals began by feeding around 200 children in Malawi in 2003. Today we serve more than 2.6 million children every school day in 16 countries.

The average worldwide cost for us to feed a child for a whole school year is just £19.15. That’s just 10p per meal.

Where children receive Mary’s Meals, there is a rise in school enrolment, attendance, and participation. We buy locally sourced food wherever possible, providing an assured market for farmers and supporting economic growth.

We work extremely hard to keep our running costs low. This is only possible because most of our work is done by many thousands of dedicated volunteers all over the world who carry out lots of little acts of love on behalf of Mary’s Meals.

Today, it is estimated that 71 million primary school-age children are out of school. Instead of sitting in a classroom, they could be working or begging in an effort to survive. Millions more attend school so hungry that they are not able to concentrate and learn.

We firmly believe that the children who receive Mary’s Meals today can one day grow up, well-nourished and well educated, to become the men and women who will lift their communities out of poverty and end their reliance on aid.

Mary’s Meals