Seeing how Africa is the 2nd largest continent in the world its a shame we dont get many people contributing. Id love to receive a postcard from someone in Ghana or Mali! Maybe its not in their culture?
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It could be postal restrictions, too.
I’ve exchanged with at least 2 members from South Africa.
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Oh, I didn’t know about that I thought any country could sent mail anywhere
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Well let’s be honest - sending postcards takes disposable income and billions in the world don’t have it right?
There are 3 excellent economic & social projects I’ve supported in Mali, Ghana & Tanzania, as have hundreds of other Postcrossers. They will send you lovely postcards for a modest donation. Please think about showing your solidarity by supporting their work.
Depending on postal slowdowns etc, cards take from 3 to 6 weeks to arrive.
Mali - https://www.postcardsfromtimbuktu.com/
Ghana - Prince & Princess Academy - https://princeandprincessacadmy.com/
Tanzania - Hearts in Unity - http://www.heartsinunity.org/
Here’s one of the postcards I received from Mali
Here’s one of the postcards I received from Ghana
Here’s one of the postcards I received from Tanzania (sorry, my scanner keeps cutting off the bottom a bit)
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Im so sorry but I cant make any donations right now. I will give it some thought in the future though
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These are great! I just donated to the Prince & Princess Academy. Will try all of them 
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On facebook there is alos someone they sell postcards and use the money for other people there.
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Thank you for the links, Lynn! I didn’t know about such projects…
I think I will donate after my next salary 
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I have several Unwritten cards in my collection from some African countries. Let’s face it, there aren’t many “tourist-type” postcards from these countries. I suppose there might be more variety when it comes to the culture of these countries, or the flora and fauna found in those nations.
As long as we are mindful that many countries in Africa are very poor. I’d prefer if they feed the family before spending on a postcard.
As Miguel_luna points out , the continent has many challenges in many countries.
I once sent a letter to a Senegalese pen pal. The letter took forever to arrive. He would go to the post every day for four months asking for his letter. It meant a lot to him. The post was ridiculously slow.
Nevertheless, I like the idea that visitors basically pay for a postcard through a charity organization.
Peace,
~ Maria
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If you looked at these projects in the links, you’d see that these are run by local groups & they sell postcards & other things as a way to raise money for local economic & social development, including feeding their families & to educate their children.
You make a donation & they send you a postcard - this practice was started to raise money for their local projects but most of the money raised goes to the projects.
You could of course make a donation without asking for a postcard, but connecting with the people involved is beneficial to both sides as you can see from the stories on their websites.
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Thank you so much for sharing these links! 
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This story is heartbreaking 
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We talked about this a lot in the past (not just about Africa but other countries with low participation to Postcrossing). Some causes will include lack of disposable income and poor postal systems/infrastructure (I know of a postcard to or from Zambia, I don’t remember, which took 2 years. I also know someone who is living in Zambia as a foreigner and was unable to get a post box or figure out how to send/receive. She said there are not even post boxes on the street for you to mail items, though I assume a post office exists). I have not been to anywhere in Africa but I imagine a lot of people live far from a city where there is a post office, so even assuming they had the money for it, it would be a lot of hassle. Also not sure postcards are widely available.
Another barrier is poor knowledge of the English language, maybe that is not so bad in some African countries, but it might be in other parts of the world (or parts of Africa where French is the language left behind by colonisers, not English).
There are of course projects like the ones mentioned above, and sometimes postcrossers in African countries are Westerners who happen to work there (and might have disposable income). Of course South Africa is not so uncommon, and Northern African countries like Morocco/Algeria are rare enough but not as much as other parts of Africa.
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Thank you for sharing!
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Its a bit of both, its firstly not a cultural thing. Most of Africa is quite poor and this impacts on two levels, firstly there is not really postal infrastructure or systems, secondly paying for post cards, postage is not the first priority when either you try to survive yourself or seeing your neighbor in need. Then secondly the cultural impacts, there is still a lot of ‘western’ and even Eastern hobbies not practiced by many in Africa. True you will find the occasional few people with interest like these or expats living in a country. But Africa has quite a large amount of their own hobbies to practice.
Lastly its not so widely know, I, myself living in South Africa had no idea that post cards would still be ‘a thing’ in this day and age, I mainly stumbled over here in search of pen friends, as I knew that was still a practice worldwide and wanted to expand my circle.
I though am working a some suggestions to make it more popular, for example adding a teachers account or something on PC. Not every body here have access to internet or even computers. So something where lets say a school teacher could request for his class and then run everything via his own personal post box…that might make it easier for teachers around here to introduce school children to the world of post and how it works etc. But still working on that thought…
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There are people who do this already. I think for some it works well. I mean, the account belongs to the teacher and they deal with the cards and how to involve the kids.
It works less well when the teachers force all the kids to sign up and have their own account as some won’t really use it or understand how it works (I know that is not what you were saying, but his has happened recently).
If you are suggesting a separate type of account for teachers, I wonder how that would work, or if the way people currently do it is sufficient.
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That’s her group with more information about it too.
Postcards from Africa and other rare countries
But now it is arround 7 euros for one postcard!
Also this person is safe but ask money for cards about rwanda, burundi, uganda.
Lara
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