Charities we Support | Pure Turtle | Wellfound

Our Chosen Charities

When we were first coming up with the idea of Pure Turtle, one of the first things we said we wanted to do was to support worthwhile charitable causes.

We have selected two charities to support and we will support them in two main ways.

Firstly we will share information about current projects the charity is working on and spread the word to help them gain followers and let people know the great work they are doing.

Secondly, we will donate a percentage of our profits to these charities to help enable them to keep working.

We have chosen Wellfound and The Sea Turtle Conservancy.

Wellfound - www.wellfound.org.uk

In 2005, Howard Measham (the founder) witnessed the suffering and hardship faced by disadvantaged communities in Romania due to lack of clean water. This led him to place several of his own properties into a trust – the Measham Family Christian Foundation – solely to support relief work through the provision of clean water. Since then, WellFound has focused its work in Africa, where the need is equally great. Rental income from the properties in trust now supports all administrative and operational costs in the UK, and also provides match-funding for work in Africa. This allows them to commit to donors that 100% of their money will go towards work in Africa with no deduction for administration or salaries in the UK.

What Wellfound do:

WellFound provides a holistic and comprehensive programme of activities for the remotest villages in Africa. Our work includes:

Installing wells. Depending on the soil conditions, wells are dug up to 25 metres deep. Hand pumps and solar pumps are installed with community support.
Providing community latrines. They empower families to have their own family latrines. They do this by carrying out a Community-Led Total Sanitation programme (CLTS) which ensures that the community understands the importance of safe sanitation.
Organising market gardens. Once communities have access to clean water, they have new opportunities to grow vegetables for their own consumption and also to sell. A market garden improves both their health and their wealth. The women of the villages are trained by our expert agricultural technicians, they are provided with tools and given guidance in selling their produce.
Promoting good health. They spend a lot of time with the communities we help to encourage a positive change in their habits. They work with them to show how to keep the water clean and safe, how to improve personal hygiene and also specifically discuss women’s health.
Ensuring equality. They work with all sections of the communities to ensure that all have equal say in their own village affairs. They believe a society that has equality in decision making and which shares responsibilities makes a huge positive impact.
Ensuring sustainability. They help the communities to plan how to sustain and maintain their facilities. They train two young people from each village in construction and pump repairs. Communities are encouraged to start up a “Community Maintenance Fund” which will be used to maintain the facilities. They also link-local government and other NGOs to continue to support the villages.

Where they work:

WellFound operates in the very remotest parts of the countries they work in. They believe that with limited resources, greater impact can be made if they work with the most vulnerable communities. Over the years, they have worked in Senegal, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau and Kenya.

Where the money goes:

100% of all donations go directly to projects with these vulnerable communities. They are able to keep up this promise as administrative and development costs are met by the Measham Family Christian Foundation. If you are able to make a substantial donation, we can dedicate this to a specific project in a specific village.

The Sea Turtle Conservancy
- https://conserveturtles.org/

It is the mission of Sea Turtle Conservancy to ensure the survival of sea turtles within the Caribbean, Atlantic and Pacific through research, education, training, advocacy and protection of the natural habitats upon which they depend.

The Sea Turtle Conservancy, formerly known as the Caribbean Conservation Corporation, is the world’s oldest sea turtle research and conservation group. An international nonprofit 501(c) 3 organization, Sea Turtle Conservancy was founded in 1959 by world-renowned sea turtle expert Dr Archie Carr to save sea turtles from imminent extinction through rigorous science-based conservation. Headquartered in Florida, the organization carries out worldwide programs to conserve and recover sea turtle populations through research, education, advocacy and protection of the natural habitats upon which they depend.

Over the course of nearly 60 years, Sea Turtle Conservancy’s research programs have yielded much of what is now known about sea turtles and the threats they face, and the organization is applying this knowledge to carry out the world’s most successful sea turtle protection and recovery programs.

Why Sea Turtles:
STC has chosen sea turtles as the focus of its conservation efforts in part because these ancient creatures are among the most important indicators of the health of the world’s marine and coastal ecosystems. STC believes that whether sea turtles ultimately vanish from the planet or whether they remain a wild and thriving part of the natural world, will speak volumes about both the general health of the planet and the ability of humans to sustainably coexist with the diversity of life on Earth.

Track a Turtle...

You can track turtles that the conservancy are studying here - https://conserveturtles.org/sea-turtle-tracking-active-sea-turtles/

Research

Sea Turtle Conservancy’s geographic focus is the Wider Caribbean and Atlantic because of the region’s unique importance to the world’s remaining sea turtle populations. The colonies of green turtles, loggerheads, hawksbills and leatherbacks that nest at Tortuguero in Costa Rica, Chiriqui Beach in Panama, and in Florida are among the largest remaining in the Western Hemisphere. In response, STC concentrates its efforts toward these critical nesting beaches. The highly migratory nature of sea turtles dictates that STC include the whole Caribbean basin within its geographic scope. Therefore, programs have been initiated in Bermuda and the Eastern Caribbean because of the important roles these areas play in the life cycle of sea turtles.

See some of their research projects here - https://conserveturtles.org/stc-programs-research-projects/

Education

In 1993, the Sea Turtle Conservancy established its Educational Program to begin directly engaging in issues that affect U.S. nesting populations of sea turtles. In 2007, Education Programs were established at STC’s research sites in Tortuguero, Costa Rica, and Bocas del Toro, Panama.

Drawing on Sea Turtle Conservancy’s five decades of international sea turtle conservation experience, this program is improving the survival outlook for marine turtles in the United States, especially in Florida (which supports 90% of all the sea turtle nesting in the continental U.S.), as well as projects in Central America, by empowering small, local sea turtle groups, providing educational materials, recognizing citizens and businesses working for the benefit of sea turtles and their habitats, and establishing the concept of using sea turtle migration-tracking tracking as an online educational tool.

Environmental Education is an educational process that allows individuals and communities to create awareness of their environment and the conflicts affecting them, through understanding, appreciating, respecting and acquiring habits and customs. The goal is to foster awareness in human beings, leading them to an individual and collective action for the resolution of present and future environmental problems which might lead to a change in society’s paradigm.

Learn more here - https://conserveturtles.org/stc-programs-educational-initiatives/

Support the Sea Turtle Conservancy

You can support the conservancy in several ways:

Make a donation - https://conserveturtles.org/support-stc-make-a-donation-to-stc-2/

Adopt a turtle - https://conserveturtles.org/support-stc-join-stc-and-adopt-a-turtle/