Bringing hope for the future to Kagera

Welcome to Tumaini Fund Canada

“Tumaini” is Swahili for hope and the Tumaini Fund is bringing support and hope for a better future to AIDS orphans widows and poor families in the Kagera region in the north-west of Tanzania. Support work in Kagera is delivered through 5 hubs of social-workers based in the towns of Muleba, Ngara, Chato, Karagwe and Biharamulo.

During the genocides in Rwanda and Burundi, rebels fled across the border into Tanzania raising HIV infectivity and leaving communities in desperate need.

Infant mortality is 12% in Kagera, with 12 in every 100 infants born dying before the age of 1, usually due to gastroenteritis.

Guided by Jesus’s words—“Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me”—Tumaini reaches out to the most vulnerable: orphans and children living in extreme poverty. Today, the need is greater than ever. In Kagera, the number of AIDS orphans has surged from around 100,000 receiving some support in 2022 to more than 212,000 in 2025, placing immense pressure on already stretched resources.

Find out how you can help

Tumaini helps break the cycle of poverty by giving children the education and practical skills they need to build a better future. From school uniforms and supplies for primary students to vocational training in trades like tailoring, carpentry, plumbing, and electrical work, young people graduate ready to support themselves and their families.

Today, Tumaini also supports students in colleges and universities—celebrating its first orphan graduate as a medical doctor and helping more than 400 students pursue higher education.

Join us in bringing hope and opportunity to these children by providing safe shelter, food, clean water, loving care, and life-changing education.

Donate

Canada Wide Support

We are thrilled to share that in 2023 Tumaini Fund Canada became a charity with Canada-wide support.

A Christian Ontario-based Private Foundation with decades of experience in Africa and which, not coincidently, had been silently following Tumaini’s progress for a number of years through direct contacts with Dr. Susan, began to support Tumaini’s work with very substantial annual gifts. These were to help education needs, to provide hundreds of sewing machines and sets of carpentry tools, and in 2025 the Foundation has funded the construction of several buildings in the Chato area to house new tailoring and carpentry schools as well as to provide an adequate headquarter building for Tumaini’s operations in the area.

Ryan Lewis, Lewis INC.