In the Democratic Republic of Congo, RAF Global focuses on strengthening sustainable livelihoods for women and youth across the communes of Kimbanseke, Nsele, Mont Ngafula, and Selembao in Kinshasa province. The programme addresses systemic barriers to employment and entrepreneurship by building skills, improving access to finance, and fostering enterprise ecosystems that promote long-term economic resilience.
Skill development has been a foundational component of RAF Global's work in DRC, delivered through vocational training centres located within accessible distances of target communities. The training programme covers a wide range of market-oriented trades, including motor vehicle mechanics, tailoring, beauty and grooming, baking, electrical work, carpentry, mobile banking, and basic computer skills. The expansion into technical trades such as electrical work and carpentry reflects an effort to create more market-driven and inclusive livelihood opportunities.
Training programmes are hands-on and vary in duration depending on the competencies required. Training centres are located within or at a manageable distance from target communities, making them widely accessible. Till 2025, over 9,000 trainees have graduated from these programmes, gaining pathways into both wage employment and self-employment.
RAF Global aims to integrate training with real-world application. During the COVID-19 pandemic, 95 women trained in tailoring were engaged in producing 76,000 masks, contributing to both income generation and public health efforts. Similarly, youth trained in bakery skills at the Pediatrics De Mama Koko orphanage are employed in ongoing production operations, enabling a transition from institutional care to financial independence.
Social Enterprise Funds (SEF) have been introduced in D.R. Congo to provide interest-free loans to individuals, groups, and micro-businesses, promoting women- and youth-centric economic enterprises. Till 2025, a total of 689 beneficiaries have received SEF support from RAF Global in the form of sewing machines, raw materials, tools, and other resources to help them start commercial activities. This support is typically extended to graduates of the vocational training centres. Requiring repayment adds accountability and ensures that recipients treat the SEF as hard-earned rather than a handout, resulting in a noticeably greater commitment to establishing their enterprises.
In addition, in 2024 RAF Global began supporting aspiring women and youth to become mobile banking agents, extending financial services to underserved areas in 2024. Beneficiaries receive interest-free loans to start their ventures, enabling them to offer essential financial services to their communities while achieving economic empowerment. As of 2025, over 34 people are supported under this initiative.
RAF Global is committed to fostering financial inclusion for marginalised individuals, helping them access vital financial services and participate more actively in the local economy. A key initiative involves the gradual introduction of self-help groups, which encourage savings, internal lending, and collective action for activities such as input sourcing and group-based marketing. These groups also receive financial support in the form of group-managed funds, equitably utilised to support individual enterprises.
RAF Global actively encourages its graduates to secure income, enhance existing earnings, and diversify their livelihoods. Seed capital support for commercial enterprises is one component of this broader micro-enterprise ecosystem. By 2025, a total of 3,881 beneficiary students and graduates had used vocational centre space and equipment free of charge to fulfil work orders they sourced independently. RAF Global also gives preference to its graduates when awarding work orders for school infrastructure development and similar projects.
Additionally, RAF Global supports a collective of youth employed at the bakery of the Pediatrics De Mama Koko orphanage in Kimbondo, Mont Ngafula commune. These youth received seed capital to establish a bread production and sales chain using the orphanage's bakery space and equipment. The full network of producers and sellers in this system now earns a steady income through this growing micro-enterprise.
RAF Global implements agriculture-focused projects in the city province of Kinshasa, across four communes: Kimbanseke, Nsele, Mont Ngafula, and Selembao. The programme promotes sustainable farming practices that enhance resilience to climate change while improving income and food security for smallholder farmers
RAF Global provides support and technical guidance for setting up compost beds, helping farmers transition from chemical-based pesticides to organic fertilisers. Through information dissemination, training, and the celebration of environment-related observance days, RAF Global has been steadily building community trust in climate-smart agriculture technologies
Over 1,000 people across the four communes have developed enhanced farming skills in horticulture and are working towards establishing locally grown crops for commercial use. This not only has the potential to improve their incomes but also helps meet the nutritional needs of their families.
RAF Global carries out a range of initiatives to reinforce and improve the education system in D.R. Congo, with a clear focus on promoting equitable and universal access to quality education.
RAF Global works to improve access to and quality of education through its School Improvement Programme (SIP), which encompasses the construction of schools, improvements to water and sanitation facilities, and the provision of child-friendly, durable classroom infrasstructure. The programme also supports the upgrading of school libraries and the supply of sports equipment, ensuring that children benefit not only from better academic infrastructure but also from opportunities for physical training and the development of sportsmanship.
In a context where 3.5 million primary school-age children are out of school and only 67% of those who enter first grade complete sixth grade, RAF Global focuses on supporting the most vulnerable enrolled children to attend regularly and remain within the public education system.
At the start of every academic year, RAF Global coordinates a 'Back to School Campaign', which includes the distribution of school kits and the facilitation of fee sponsorships and waivers for the most vulnerable students, advancing the cause of free education. Nearly 9,000 students have benefited directly from these twin efforts.
These initiatives are focused on selected schools and orphanages in the communes of Selembao, Kimbanseke, Nsele, Mont Ngafula, Lemba, and Masina.
RAF Global is working to close the digital divide for children in underserved, low-income communities by strengthening Information and Communication Technology (ICT) education in schools. The initiative enhances access to digital tools and learning, while actively encouraging girls to build confidence and engage with information technology, equipping them with critical skills for the future.
RAF Global periodically organises training programmes for public school teachers in rural areas, complementing the Government's own efforts. In addition to pedagogical training aimed at improving lesson delivery and student engagement, these forums foster cross-learning and peer support among teachers
A stimulating environment in the early years is essential for brain development and lays the foundation for stronger competencies and personality development in later life. Since 2022, RAF Global has been establishing Early Childhood Development (ECD) centres that enrol children between the ages of 3 and 6 for classes focused on fine motor skills, cognitive development, and social skills, all within a safe and nurturing environment. .
A total of 1493 preschool children have benefitted from six well-equipped ECD centres in the communes of Kimbanseke, Nsele, and Mont Ngafula, where they also receive one nutritious meal each day.
Good health is critical to breaking the cycle of poverty at the individual, family, and community levels, and is a precondition for progress across several of the Sustainable Development Goals. D.R. Congo faces significant public health challenges: it is home to the third largest population of the global poor, cataract remains a leading cause of preventable blindness despite the low complication rate of corrective surgeries, 90% of the rural population depends on freshwater springs for water, chronic malnutrition affects 43% of children between the ages of 0 and 5, and malaria continues to be one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality, accounting for 22% of all malaria-related deaths globally in 2018.
In response to these challenges, RAF Global complements the Government of D.R. Congo's health services and promotes the wellbeing of vulnerable groups, including the elderly, children, girls, and women, across the primary project communes of Selembao, Mont Ngafula, Kimbanseke, and Nsele in Kinshasa province.
Despite being located within the Congo River Basin and richly endowed with natural water resources, D.R. Congo continues to face significant challenges in ensuring equitable access to safe drinking water, with many communities still lacking reliable clean water for daily needs.
In response, RAF Global has implemented a targeted intervention focused on constructing low-cost water tanks and surface wells at freshwater spring sites, providing underserved rural communities with reliable access to safe water for drinking and domestic use.
By 2025, RAF Global has created 220 such community water assets serving a population of over 580,000, contributing to improved sanitation practices, a reduction in waterborne diseases, and better nutritional outcomes for children.
RAF Global spearheads an eye care initiative spanning all communes in Kinshasa province. Through regular outreach in communities and schools, RAF Global raises awareness about the restoration of vision through cataract surgery and the prevention of blindness. It identifies poor, high-risk patients who cannot afford basic medical expenses and supports local hospitals in health campaigns that promote general health, including eye care. To date, RAF Global has sponsored and facilitated over 6,500 cataract surgeries in partnership with nine hospitals across Masina, Lisanga, Lemba, Libikisi, Bandalungwa, and Etonga/Nsele.
In the face of widespread food insecurity and malnutrition in D.R. Congo, kitchen garden and backyard farming initiatives with women are highly relevant tools for improving nutritional intake at the household level. Through training complemented by the distribution of seeds, saplings, farming tools, and access to fertile land, 245 beneficiaries are actively involved in vegetable production, both for household consumption and for sale in the local market directly improving the nutritional intake of the households.
Further, the kitchen gardens are thriving at the Centre Nutritionnel Soeur Veronique Natival in Mpasa, Nsele commune, where girls and women from impoverished households gather not only for two meals a day but also to learn skills in organic crop production and backyard farming. Every week, the harvest provides nutritious meals to undernourished children and pregnant and lactating women who visit the centre.
RAF Global's social safety net initiative in D.R. Congo has been a sustained effort since 2017, contributing significantly to the survival and improved health of vulnerable populations, including orphaned children in institutional care and the elderly in community settings. Regular nutrition aid to the nutrition centre in Nsele effectively addresses malnutrition among children and meets the dietary needs of expecting and lactating women in the area. To date, around 18,000 child beneficiaries, vulnerable women, and elderly individuals across the communes of Nsele, Mont Ngafula, and Limete have received regular nutritious meals and food baskets through RAF Global's partnerships.
Through regular health education and sensitisation sessions in schools, orphanages, community settings, and vocational training centres, RAF Global helps rural residents build defences against infections, vector-borne diseases, reproductive health complications, and health emergencies. Efforts to promote good handwashing and sanitation practices, oral health, menstrual hygiene management, and the prevention of malaria and HIV/AIDS, as well as encouraging timely access to medical treatment, have directly reached more than 36,600 vulnerable individuals across four communes, in addition to the communes of Makala, Limete, and Lemba.
Humanitarian Response is an emerging programme area for RAF Global in D.R. Congo, built on the ability to rapidly bring together resources, knowledge, and community networks to support affected populations within critical timeframes.
During the first phase of COVID-19 in 2020, RAF Global quickly mobilised its vocational training centres, engaging 95 tailoring graduates in the production of 76,000 cloth masks. Of these, 16,000 were distributed to schools, orphanages, and community hubs across Kimbanseke, Nsele, and Mont Ngafula. Alongside mask production and distribution, RAF Global carried out active information campaigns on COVID-19 safeguards, safe distancing, and handwashing hygiene, all critical components of an effective public health response.
Despite the disruptions of two successive pandemic phases, RAF Global ensured uninterrupted nutrition aid to children and women with infants, providing freshly prepared nutritious meals to help build immunity and ward off disease.
Beyond the pandemic, RAF Global has periodically reached out to elderly populations with food support and warm clothing during winter months, and has responded to a range of other community emergencies as they have arisen.