Veronica  is running in the Boston Marathon this Patriots Day and she needs your help and support !

As many of you know, running THE Marathon has been on my "bucket list" for sometime and I am VERY EXCITED to have the opportuity to run the BOSTON MARATHON in April 2012 .I cannot think of a better place to run 26.2 miles other than Beautiful New England and the place I have called home for the last 6 years!

This  oportunity to participate in the the marathon came about through some friends who are actively involved in a very worthy cause called Self Help Africa (SHA)[ http://www.selfhelpafrica.org/selfhelp/Main/Home.asp]

For more than 25 years, Self Help Africa has sought to strengthen agricultural systems, improve access to services and inputs, and provide rural African communities with the opportunities to market and sell their produce. Self Help Africa works with local staff and partners in nine countries, supporting communities to grow more food, diversify their farm production, develop new off-farm enterprise, and sell their surpluses.

SHA also has a current initiative which is close to my heart as it focuses on Women & Development (changeherlife.org.) This petition requests increasing funding support for women within existing budgets for agricultural development in Africa.Women make an enormous contribution to rural development and food production in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet African women currently receive as little as 5% of the available supports - training, access to inputs, to land, and to farm credit.By ring-fencing funding for women, you will be giving millions of rural African women a fair deal, and also helping to increase food production in sub-Saharan Africa by up to 20%.

I will be gruiling it out for 26.2 miles in support of something I feel so strongly about and I ask that you join in my cause by donating. Every dollar you donate will help ten-fold in the countries SHA supports!Thanks in advance for all your support and generous donations that will help me achieve a personal dream while silmulatneously improving the lives of others.  

Thank you & God Bless,
Veronica Kelly