One of the gifts proving most popular this Christmas is also one of the least plausible — a goat for an African family. Yet demand is such that FARM-Africa, the London-based charity organising the appeal has been inundated: “The phones are going mad and we have had to take on temporary staff,” says Dr Christie Peacock, the chief executive.

She is delighted that the appeal has caught the imagination of a public jaded by the rampant consumerism that goes with this time of the year. People who give goats make a donation, which is usually in the name of a child who receives a folder complete with a small plastic goat, telling him or her about the gift and what it means. Goats cost £30 or you can donate a clutch of chickens for a mere £10.

“It is a tangible, practical gift,” says Christie, who founded the scheme in Ethiopia in the 1980s. “It literally transforms families’ lives.

“Our organisation focuses on the poorest of the poor, people who have land but no livestock, so that when the rains fail, they have nothing to fall back on. The gift of a goat gives them the first step out of abject poverty because goats provide milk and can be sold for money.” But why not a cow? “I feel strongly that poor families are better off with five or six goats than one cow. If the cow sickens and dies, they are back where they started. It is about spreading risks.”

Christie studied agriculture at Reading University and then went to Kenya to research for her PhD. It was there that she realised the potential of goats in tropical countries. Always fascinated by Ethiopia, when she saw an advertisement placed by a charity she had never heard of for a job on a goat-keeping project there, she applied and stayed for seven years.

FARM-Africa, then a new British development agency, exists to help people living in famine and poverty to produce food so that they do not have to depend on aid handouts.

After nearly 20 years overseas, Christie went to work in the London office of FARM-Africa, becoming deputy director and then, five years ago, chief executive.

She soon discovered that, financially, the charity was struggling: “I had to make some horrible decisions and redundancies. The staff both here and overseas had to work extremely hard to ensure our survival.”

In 2000 Christie ran the London marathon, raising £50,000 for FARM-Africa. She did it partly to prove how serious she was about saving the organisation.

Today the charity employs 200 people in Africa and 20 in London: “We also have a business plan to double in size, and it is very rewarding to know that we have turned ourselves around.”

Christie is in Africa as often as she is in the UK, which made her choice of PA pivotal. That role is fulfilled by Shohko Iwami. Christie describes her as exceptionally bright. “She is desperate to get into development work and felt this was a way in. Shohko also looks after personnel, administration and IT — she is a superwoman. I travel a lot and rely on her hugely. We keep in touch increasingly by text messaging; even in the most remote places in Africa, coverage is improving,” she says.

Christie acknowledges that Shohko’s ambitions mean that she is unlikely to stay a PA forever: “The challenge will be to keep her for as long as we can and give her interesting things to do while hopefully giving her the right background.

“Development work is hard to get into because it is over-subscribed and experience counts for as much as a PhD, which is a chicken and egg situation.” Why do so many people want to work in a field which pays poorly and can be uncomfortable and dangerous? “It is all about idealism and the good old-fashioned sense of wanting to be of service to others. There is nowhere that needs more help than Ethiopia, yet the women I have worked with there, despite their day-to-day struggles, have such humour and pride. They have so few opportunities and when they get one, they take it so seriously.”

Nobody in this country, she says, should think for one moment that donating a goat or chickens is in any way frivolous or wasted.

Shohko is Japanese and lived in Tokyo until she was 13 when her family moved to Amsterdam where her businessman father was seconded. She went to an international school and learnt English and then came to university in this country. Was it hard? “Very, because I was on my own for the first time and my English wasn’t that good.”

She became interested in humanitarian and development issues and took a postgraduate diploma in world politics at the London School of Economics. She also has an MSc in development studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. Now 35, Shohko has worked in Tokyo and London for multi-national companies.

“I have done voluntary work for Amnesty International in both Japan and Holland, but this is my first paid job in charity. I did work for commercial companies but I felt that as you spend so many hours in offices, I might as well work for an organisation with which I had empathy. FARM-Africa is quite small but we do big things in Africa and we really do make a difference.

“I regard this job as a stepping stone: I would like to do research, campaigning or advocacy work. I think the fact that as a PA, I have to be well organised and efficient will always stand me in good stead.”

Not that Shohko is even faintly dismissive of her current role: “I do have other responsibilities but I thoroughly enjoy the PA element. Obviously, it is quite a challenge, juggling so many different tasks, but the PA side is important because it is all about lightening the workload of someone I admire for her passion and commitment.”

• There is still time to donate a goat or a clutch of chickens. www.farmafrica.org.uk

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