We need to grow!

Our 12-month mission: Let's keep those sewing machines whirring!

We did it! 16,000 Pacha Pads made up into 2,000 kits of eight have arrived in Poland where our partner, Yorghas Foundation, will send them into hospitals in Eastern Ukraine along with their life saving birthing kits.

Together, we achieved this fantastic goal in just three months. Whether you are sewing in the UK or elsewhere around the world, you are an essential part of this incredible team. Whether the Pacha Pads journey near or far, they are all going to people who really, really need them.

We owe a huge thanks to Shanice at Distribute Aid for finding us a solution to transport the pads to Poland from the UK and even bigger thanks to Troels, who is leading a convoy of mini buses to Poland, financed by EdenAid.org, taking our kits to the door of Yorghas in Kyrnica. Since March they have been driving aid into Poland every week and then driving Ukrainians back to UK host families. What an incredible group of humans!

What’s next?

The demand for our Pacha Pads is huge and is growing all the time as Pachamama becomes more widely known, with the media, with sewists, with refugee NGOs and with people working to tackle period poverty around the world.

This is our plan for the next 12 months:

April -June 2022

Ukraine! We just sent 16,000 pads made in just 3 months by you lovely humans to Poland, to be sent off to hospitals in Ukraine for new mothers living in conflict zones.

July 2022

July - October 2022

October - November 2022

November 2022 - May 2023

November 2022 - May 2023

UK and Turkey

Meanwhile, all US made pads will continue to head to Washington DC to Food Justice DMV where the need is endless. Pads made in Italy, the Netherlands and the rest of Europe will stay more local as we try and keep our distributions as sustainable as possible. The most recent distribution of European made pads were sent to Riga, Latvia for Ukrainian refugee women and we will play it by ear where the next batch go!

We need to grow!

This is a flexible plan in that, if we are approached by other organisations where we think we can help, we will of course do so. We want you to know who you are supporting as we go forward.

We need to keep growing the volunteer base so that we can meet the ever-increasing demand.

Please tell all your sewing/crafting/friends with a sewing machine friends and family and let’s see what we can achieve together by this time next year.

Meanwhile, a really massive thank you for making a real difference to the lives of so many vulnerable people. Whether you make eight pads or 8,000, you are tangibly and positively changing the life and prospects of women and girls. From your hands to theirs, you are giving someone five years of freedom from worry, shame and monthly disruption.