Pebbles Project AGM & launch of the FACET Foundation at Warwick wine estate

Does the Wine Industry “Give Anything Back”? You bet it does. Last week we told you how the R20 000 awarded to each of the top 10 Chenins goes right back into the local community for upliftment. This week, we want to tell you about the Pebbles Project, as some of that money was going to it. You may have already contributed to Pebbles, consciously or unconsciously. In certain local restaurants a voluntary amount is added to your bill as a donation.

The Pebbles Project’s purpose is to enrich the lives of children with special educational needs from disadvantaged backgrounds, especially those whose lives are affected by alcohol, through providing support and training to local wine farm and township crèches and establishing after-school provision for older children living in the Winelands.

The FACET Foundation (UK), established in 2008 by Laurence Graff, and the Pebbles Project Trust have partnered to provide mobile education programmes for children living on farms in the Western Cape. On Wednesday this week, we attended the Pebbles AGM held on Warwick, where two magnificent buses were donated to the projects by Delaire Graff. Delaire Graff has raised an astronomical 8.5 million Rand in private and public donations to Pebbles over the last couple of years. Both buses are fully fitted out, one as a computer lab and the other as a mobile library.

The two Learning Centre vans await the ribbon cutting ceremony. On the left is PR and Marketing Manager for Delaire Graff, Tanja Mackay Davidson

The inside of the mobile library. It is full of wonderful books and DVDs and other media for the children to borrow

Some of the children from the farms concerned, with Johann Laubser, General Manager at Delaire Graff, and colleagues

This young man was full of life and personality. He will definitely benefit from both vans

I am strong! Someone in the background looks a little dubious

This is the Computer centre. Everything they could need has been provided

In the car park at Warwick wine estate, overlooked by the huge Madiba statue, made entirely of beads and wire. He would approve

Two other Pebbles vans, one for transport, the other is a much needed toy library

Sophie Warner, head of the Pebbles Project in South Africa, tells us about the donation by FACET and what it would mean to the children

Johann Laubser tells us how the money was raised by the Graff family, the FACET Trust and Delaire Graff Hotel and wine estate

The ceremonial scissors

The ribbon is cut, to everyone’s delight

A magical unrehearsed moment was when some of the waiting children started to pick up the pebbles beneath their feet

Please Miss, can I go and have a look?

A place of learning and fantasy

The schedule of where the van will be next, bar codes and colour coding will all help

Space for the librarian

Thank you SO much for the donation

Now we can get a look in

Norma Ratcliffe of Warwick with a friend

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2014