Sanctuary Housing Group Board Member Joan Blaney CBE and her cousin, singer Beverley Knight MBE, are heading a year-long campaign to raise £1 million to help Aids orphans in Johannesburg, South African.
The two women will launch the Beads Project for Africa to coincide with World Aids Day on December 1.
Women in Johannesburg are making millions of bead badges which carry the international Aids logo which will then be sold all over the world for the equivalent of £1 to raise money for the orphanage scheme.
Joan, who was awarded the CBE for her work with community-based charity Scarman Trust, said: “I have just returned from South Africa where I saw the terrible situation for myself. A whole generation of children have been orphaned by Aids. The women who are left are desperately poor but they still take in orphans, many of whom are found wandering the streets in confusion or sitting next to parents who have died from the disease.”