ST. PAUL, Minn., July 17, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Books For Africa (BFA), a non-profit based in St. Paul with a warehouse in Atlanta, today announced that it has shipped 2.4 million educational, library and law books valued at over $33 million to 21 African countries in the fiscal year ended June 30.
In addition, BFA has shipped 223 computers and 11 new law and human rights law libraries. More than $2.3 million was raised last year to ship the books to the students of Africa.
Books For Africa remains the largest shipper of donated text and library books to Africa with over 33 million books shipped to 49 countries since its founding in 1988. In addition, more than 665 computers and 200 e-readers containing 1.6 million digital books have been shipped.
Other highlights from fiscal year 2015 include:
•Top recipient countries were Nigeria (46 container units with each container holding 11,000 books), Ethiopia (22 container units), and Ghana, Kenya and Uganda (20 units each).
•The top shipping partner was the Sir Emeka Offor Foundation of Nigeria. BFA completed a $600,000 grant from the Foundation to ship over one million books valued at over $13 million to 19 African countries.
•Because of increased demand for books, BFA is planning to double its Atlanta warehouse capacity this year.
•In its effort to reach out to African countries, BFA hosted ambassadors from Uganda, Kenya and Liberia at events in Minnesota and BFA officials were hosted by the Tanzanian ambassador in Washington, D.C.
•BFA continued to partner with a host of other organizations to ship more books including the Peace Corps, U.S. embassies in Africa, Out of Print, Better World Books, USAID, World Reader and Little Free Library.
BFA was founded by Tom Warth in 1988 with a simple mission: To end the book famine in Africa.
"We are proud that BFA has been able to serve the students and young readers of Africa during the past year with more than two million books and other educational tools," said Patrick Plonski, executive director. "We plan to expand our efforts and continue to increase shipments this year."
Warth noted that there are over 500 million young people in Africa "so we still have a lot of work to do to end the book famine across the continent. There are a lot of children hungry to read and hungry to learn."
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