SurfAid International is a non-profit humanitarian aid organisation which opts to improve the health of people living in isolated regions connected to us through surfing.
The Mentawais Islands, off Sumatra, Indonesia, is home to a people rich in culture, spirituality and warmth. Blessed with the beauty of the surrounding jungle, tropical reefs and perfect waves, they live in a place which attracts many nature-goers and keen surfers alike every year.
But in 1999, Dr. Dave Jenkins, avid surfer and physician (and now the founder and medical director of SurfAid), discovered that the Mentawais Islands weren’t the paradise they were cracked up to be.
It wasn’t the surf or the surroundings that disappointed him, but the health and safety of the people. Living in a jungle environment, they are situated in villages ridden with diseases like malaria, diarrhoea, tetanus and measles. Poor hygiene, poor sanitation, and lethal chest infections plague the children here, and poor nutrition also is hindering and altering the brain development of these kids.
They do not have the opportunity to go to school.
They do not have much opportunity to achieve.
The majority of the children are completely without hope.
Malnourished and anaemic, a quarter of them die before they’re twelve.
The sad thing is, most of the conditions that are causing trouble for the people are entirely treatable. So Dr Dave, along with much support, set up SurfAid in order to make a difference, to provide an engine of change that would turn the situation in the Mentawais around.
At first, it consisted of only a few people providing malaria shots and mosquito nets. Now SurfAid is a group with offices in Australia, New Zealand and the US, dealing with a wider range of problems (including tsunami relief), that is running a highly effective, transparent and fully accountable organisation which, driven by goodwill and the human ability to create change, has made an astronomical and clearly lasting difference in the islands.
To find out more, go to http://www.surfaidinternational.org.
