Annual Reporting

Our Story in 2023

1. INTRODUCTION & WELCOME

The Trustees present their Annual Report for the Robertson Outdoor Bursary (ROB) for the year ended 31 December 2023.

In our tenth year of operations ROB continued to deliver its programme of work and build its partnerships to transform the lives of the people in Tanzania.

Thanks to our partnership with the Exodus Travels Foundation via the Mountain Lioness Project to empower women to become qualified guides on Kilimanjaro, we have now trained twentyeight out of the thirty awarded places. The remaining two women will be recruited in 2024. In addition to our ‘Lionesses’, we were also delighted to support a further three male awardees through their Guide Licence Training, thanks to the generous donations of two Kilimanjaro climbers who wanted to sponsor a guide scholarship.

The highlight of the year for us was following up on our 2022 Tanzania visit with our partner Exodus Travels Foundation to continue to support women to become guides in Tanzania and also to support our existing ‘Lionesses’ to improve their skills and knowledge and gain successful employment. Following the 2022 conference we received over thirty-five employer nominations for our awards this year which enabled us to ensure we selected the awardees most worthy of our sponsors’ donations.

We were very sad to say goodbye at the end of 2023 to our volunteer Awardee Liaison Officer, Anna Delcour. Her meticulous work in tracking our awardee progress over the last two years has been invaluable in helping us improve how we recruit and how we support our awardees. She is moving to a full time salaried position and we wish her all the best in her future.

We are delighted to welcome Kandoo Adventures as a new partner who are signposting ROB to their clients post their Kilimanjaro ascent to make donations.

Once again our annual Christmas fundraising event at Namaste Sport in Chamonix, France was a great success. This year we were also very grateful to the Chamonix branch of Club Alpin Français who held a bingo night raising enough donations to sponsor one additional awardee place for 2024. We thank all the supporters of these events who gave so generously. We also thank our regular donors for their continued support. Their constant commitment to what we do really makes a big difference to our awardees in Tanzania.

As Amazon Smile ceased operations we are pleased announce a new partnership with Easyfundraising which provides a UK based free fundraising platform enabling us to gain donations from supporters when they shop online.

Our journey continues and we promise to continue to grow and adapt to obtain the maximum benefit from every penny our supporters donate to us.

We thank all who are walking this journey with us.

Yvonne Robertson

Chair and founder of Robertson Outdoor Bursary

2. ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS

In 2023 we have continued grow and adapt our work. Our key activities have been:

1) The continuation of our partnership with the Exodus Travels Foundation and our Mountain Lioness Project; training five more women in November 2023

2) The additional training of three more men; two funded by individual donations and the third by ROB’s regular donors

3) Following up on our 2022 conference with employers and receiving over 35 nominations for our 2023 awards

4) Strengthening our partnership with Exodus Travels Foundation and agreeing to work together in the future to extend the Mountain Lioness Project

5) Two Christmas fundraising events hosted by Namaste sport and the Club Alpin Français

(Chamonix Branch)

6) Joining Easyfundraising, a UK based free fundraising shopping platform

7) Saying goodbye to our volunteer Awardee Liaison Officer Anna Delcour

8) Welcoming Kandoo adventures

2.1 Key Milestones

This year of operation was marked by the following key milestones:

January – March

• Continuation of our partnership working with the Exodus Travels Foundation

• Joining Easyfundraising

April – September

• Building on employer relations following our 2022 conference

• Recruitment of a further five women and three male awardees

October – December

• Awardees commenced guide training at the College of African Wildlife Management on 8th November, 2023

• Two Christmas fundraisers in partnership with Namaste Sport, Argentière, France and the Club Alpin Français, Chamonix, France

2.2 Kit Collections

Post-Covid our kit collection and distribution programmes remained suspended. We have maintained contact and closely monitored the situation with our partners at the Lake District National Park and the Kilimanjaro Porters Assistance Project and hope to restart this in 2024.

2.3 Fund Raising

This year we were delighted to continue our annual fundraising event in partnership with Namaste Sport, Argentière and were delighted to welcome the support from the Club Alpin Français. The two events together raised just over £1000.

We continued to receive income from Amazon Smile donations until its close in 2023. In total we gained £259 by partnering with Amazon Smile.

We received two individual donations to support two further guide scholarships from climbers who climbed Mt Kilimanjaro in 2023.

3. AWARDS & AWARDEES

Guide Training Scholarships

In 2023 we funded a further eight awardees (five women and three men) to undertake guide training at the College of African Wildlife Management. We worked in partnership with employers and the college to recruit and select the awardees. We were able to recruit five strong female candidates for the Mountain Lioness programme, agreeing with Exodus Travels Foundation to roll-over funding and recruit the final two ‘Mountain Lionesses’ in 2024. We have been tracking the progress of all our awardees through their training and work as guides on Mt Kilimanjaro

4. CORPORATE AND OTHER PARTNERS

Our partnership with the Exodus Travels Foundation to fund the Mountain Lioness Project has been our key focus and we look forward to continuing this in 2024.

We are delighted to welcome Kandoo Adventures, a UK based travel company, as a new partner. They have agreed to signpost ROB to their clients post their Kilimanjaro ascent to make donations should they wish to.

In this, our tenth year of operations, our relationships with our Tanzanian partners, The College of African Wildlife Management, the Kilimanjaro Porters Assistance Project and local employers, managers and guides, are now well established and they continue to be an indispensable source of support and advice for us on how our donors’ money can be most wisely spent. We have made several new contacts through the Guide Training Conference in 2022 which we have been following up on in 2023.

5. FINANCES

During the year we received total fundraising contributions and donations of £3299 (inclusive of Gift Aid).

We awarded grants totalling £2452 to fund places on Guide Licence Training scholarships at the College of African Wildlife Management. Our only other expenditure was on website and email hosting which cost £264.

We have a surplus of £583 which will be carried forward into our 2024 budget.

6. LOOKING FORWARD

The key challenge for us continues to be how to adapt our operations to develop our fundraising opportunities enabling us to offer new scholorships and support our existing awardees as they start their new careers. This will be a key focus for us in 2024.

Our core team’s commitment is our strongest asset and we thank them for the time and energy they devote to volunteering to work with us. We will continue to review our ways of working and seek new volunteers to support us with their unique strengths and find ways to support our volunteers who so generously gift their time to us.

Maintaining our profile via our website, social media presence and our newsletters will help us to continue build on new partnerships and keep our donors, supporters and awardees up to date with the impact of our work.

We hope to be able to continue to grow and will review how we fundraise to finance our work in the future and remain responsive to the needs of the people we seek to help in Tanzania.

Maintaining our relationships with our Tanzanian partners will be critical to ensure that we spend the money our donors have so generously given most effectively. We will continue to strengthen these partnerships and build new ones.

In the year ahead we will:

• Recruit our next cohort of awardees to our Guide Training and Mountain Lioness Scholarships.

• Finalise and submit proposals for a second phase of Mountain Lioness Scholarships and explore more ways of supporting our existing ‘Lionesses’

• Track the progress of awardees completing their Guide Licence Training, sending reports to our partner the Exodus Travels Foundation on the progress of the ‘Lionesses’

• Maintain our web and social media presence

• Continue with the Easyfundraising platform and grow the number of people who support us by shopping with this platform

We look forward to a successful 11th year of operations for our charity