Egg-a-Day Childhood Nutrition Program

A small team traveled to Haiti in 2012 after Hurricane Sandy had ravaged a portion of the country. Shocked to see so many empty seats in the schools the team learned that much of the agricultural land had been destroyed and that food scarcity had become an issue. Many children were too hungry and weak to come to school. The schools had no funds to provide food for everyone in need. The team immediately arranged for some rice, beans, and pasta to be sent to the area. But a long-range solution was needed.  

A chance meeting on the flight back from Haiti to New York led two women to discover a common concern: the hungry children they had seen during their visit. By the time the plane landed, the two had vowed not only to find a way to feed the children, but were determined to find a way to help the Haitians in the communities they serve become self-sufficient and produce their own food. That was the birth of the Egg-a-Day Nutrition Program (formerly known as OneEgg Haiti) which has, since 2013 provided high-quality animal protein in the form of a hard-boiled egg to over 2500 children throughout Haiti. The goal is to make the program sustainable by educating individuals, especially school children, about how to raise their own food and chickens.

The eggs are purchased from two poultry farms in Haiti with funds raised by various churches throughout the conference. The eggs are picked up every two weeks by our in-country program coordinator in a pick-up truck and delivered to the schools and orphanages that are part of the Egg-a-Day program. At one point, before the Covid-19 pandemic caused the closure of schools throughout Haiti, there were 17 sites from Port-au-Prince, to Mirebalais to Miragoane receiving eggs. Currently the program continues providing eggs to the orphanages where children live full time.

The eggs are delivered raw and unrefrigerated. (An unrefrigerated egg will keep for between 14 and 21 days – if not stored in the hot sunlight. Volunteers at the sites cook the eggs (mostly on open fires) and serve them to the children for breakfast, snack or lunch each day. It is hard to understand, unless you have traveled to Haiti, how difficult it is to move these eggs from the farms, to the sites, to the children over roads that are rough, clogged with traffic and sometimes not paved.

The program is funded by donations from churches and individuals throughout our conference. For several years, those donations were supplemented by additional financial support from OneEgg.org, a charitable organization that ran a similar program in Africa. However, that organization is no longer able to continue supporting our program. And, since churches throughout our conference are not meeting in person, our traditional forms of fund-raising are no longer viable. Now we rely solely on the donations from individuals and churches.

NOTE: School resumed in Haiti on August 17. Our need for financial support has taken on a new urgency. It does not take much - $60 will feed a child an egg a day for one year.

By the way, the children in Haiti love hard-boiled eggs !!