My eldest son Harry came home a couple of weeks ago and announced that he wanted to collect money for “poor people in Africa.” This gave me a wee bit of a dilemma as I worry that much of our ‘charity’ locks developing countries into poverty by undermining the very local markets they rely on for that development, but I wanted to encourage my young son’s philanthropy, so choosing the right charity was paramount. I put a request for suggestions out on Facebook/Twitter for suggestions and my good friend Neil Bradbury suggested SolarAid.

SolarAid distributes solar powered lamps to villages without electricity to allow school kids to study in the evening without relying on highly polluting kerosene lamps. The lamps go out via a network of local entrepreneurs and they have to be purchased at a subsidised price which allayed my fears that a donation could be damaging in the long term – plus the renewable energy angle rang my bell.

Anyway, Harry collected £24.00 and we sent it off to SolarAid with a note from the man himself. Yesterday a card arrived with delightful personal messages to Harry from the SolarAid team thanking him for his efforts. Cue misty eyes from his parents.

So if you do want to make a contribution to those less fortunate this Christmas, my whole hearted recommendation would be SolarAid!