Heifer 12x12: 12 months, 12 countries in 2012

Aug 22, 2012
Marisa Machak

Betty Londergan has been given the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to travel around the world for a great cause performing charity work with the global hunger non-profit Heifer International. For an entire year, she is volunteering and visiting Heifer projects in twelve of the poorest and most remote countries while logging all of her journeys along the way. Hence her blog, Heifer12x12.com.

Heifer International’s mission is to end hunger and poverty while also caring for the Earth. Heifer provides thorough agricultural training to help people who struggle daily for reliable sources of food and income. The organization donates livestock to help them overcome poverty and restart their lives through smallholder farming. Heifer International currently works in forty different countries, including the U.S., to increase the self-reliance of families and communities.

Before working and blogging for Heifer, Londergan gained much attention for her previous blog, What Gives 365, where she researched non-profits while interviewing a non-profit figure every single day of the year.

This experience earned her the title of Heifer Global Blogging Ambassador. In this voluntary position, she records her Heifer 12x12 expedition through writing, photography and video clips. In the last seven months, she has visited projects in Guatemala, Appalachia USA, Haiti, Peru, China & Nepal, Cameroon, Uganda, Romania, and Rwanda. In the next four months, she will visit Armenia, Vietnam & Cambodia, Malawi and Ecuador. Her travels end on December 31.

Within Heifer 12x12, Londergan features all aspects of the countries that she visits, focusing on the benefits of Heifer projects, the cultures, animals and especially people’s touching stories. She also presents her own photography and videography, which paint a beautiful picture of each place that she has visited thus far.

“My responsibilities in this voluntary position are to meet the people who are benefiting from the animals Heifer gives to those in need, learn about the Heifer programs and trainings that go on for months before an animal is given away, and experience first-hand why Heifer has been so successful in its sixty-seven years of transforming communities through the mere gift of an animal. Then, of course, I’ll pass it all along in grand style to you,” Londergan writes in the Journey portion of the blog.

Londergan was selected as a Regional Winner for the South in the Fourth Annual CLASSY Awards under the Volunteer of the Year category for her generosity and extensive volunteer work. The awards will be celebrated at philanthropy’s biggest night, the CLASSY Awards’ red carpet ceremony on Saturday, September 22, in San Diego, Calif.

To follow Londergan on her blogging journeys, visit www.Heifer12x12.com. To learn more about Heifer International, visit www.heifer.org.