In the madness of Christmas shopping, dashing about from one end of the country to the other it's often difficult to think of others, especially those who don't even have the most basic supplies to survive.
One Belcoo lady is spear-heading a charity intent on tackling poverty around the world. Eithne McNulty is the Regional Manager of Trocaire in Northern Ireland. And the charity are urging people to think of an alternative, and priceless, Christmas gift.
Trocaire 'Global Gift' campaign is, Ms McNulty explains, one of the charity's main fund-raising schemes and is a very important time for the group and the people they help. Explaining the thinking behind the scheme, Ms McNulty said: 'Rather than buying a present for someone who already has full and plenty this is about buying a gift on behalf of that person but giving it to someone in the Developing World."
Outlining the nine gifts available from Trocaire, Ms McNulty explains: "There are a range of gifts available from £10 for a cluck of chicks for a family in East Africa. The chicks will be distributed to families who are worst affected by HIV and AIDS. HIV and AIDS is a pandemic in Africa and is becoming a real problem because carers looking after those living with AIDS are not able to work themselves so the whole poverty cycle is made worse because healthy people aren't making any money either, it's not like here where we have hospitals and support."
Other gifts available include seeds for vulnerable families in Rwanda; weaving looms for women in Guatemala, right up to £140 which will buy a house for a family in India.
Ms McNulty explains people are increasing recognising the impact a Global Gift can have and every year more and more people contact Trocaire to purchase this life-changing present.
On a personal level, Ms McNulty is clearly embracing her new role. She explained how she came to be involved with Trocaire: "I have always had an interest in world development and throughout my life have worked in the voluntary and charity sectors. I saw the job with Trocaire advertised and thought that would be a very nice job to have. So I applied for the job and took up the role in June last year."
Asked to outline her job Ms McNulty's enthusiasm is tangible: "I have responsibility for directing the work of Trocaire in Northern Ireland. We have a number of different functions including a mandate to work overseas obviously, but also to work at home with people in Ireland to raise awareness about world poverty among people here.
"Working with Trocaire has been fantastic, it's the kind of work I've always wanted to do. If I was doing it all over again I'd probably start my career in somewhere like Africa working at the coal-face with people in poverty stricken communities."
Interestingly Ms McNulty explains many of the skills she learnt working in community development in Fermanagh in the early 70's she has been able to use right across the Developing World: "I started off many years ago working with the Rural Development Council in Enniskillen and I think there are so many similarities with the work we are doing with communities overseas to build their capacity to empower them to take care of themselves. There is such a similarity between that kind of work and the type of community development I was doing back in the 70's in Fermanagh with rural groups.
"Whether in Roslea or Newtownbutler or in the hills of Kenya, it's so similar. It is all about local people coming together to talk about their situation and what sort of help they need from people like ourselves. But the principles of community development are the same the world over," she adds.
Anyone interested in purchasing a Trocaire Global Gift this Christmas should go to www.trocaire.org or phone 0800 912 1200.
