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2025-03-31-accounts

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Meninadanca

(Registered charity, number 1095638) Financial statements for the year ended 31 March 2025

Page Contents
2-5 Trustees’ annual report
6 Independent examiner’s report
7 Receipts & payments account
8 Statement of assets
9 Notestotheaccounts

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Meninadancga Trustees’ Annual Report for the year ended 3! March 2025

Full name Meninadanga

Other names by which the charity has been known

Criancas (Old name) Pedraviva (Old name)

Registered charity number 1095638

Principal address 8 Old Terrace, Pleasley, Notts, NGI9 7QR

UK Office address Bishop’s Stortford Baptist Centre, Twyford Road, Bishop’s Stortford, Herts CM23 3LJ

Trustees

David Roper (chair)

Yaa Owusua

Matthew Roper

Charlotte Piek

Simon Cole (treasurer)

Georgina Butten (to 16" November 2024) Katherine Wilkinson (from 13" September 2024)

Independent examiner

Peter Wright, St John’s Centre, St John Street, Mansfield NGI8 1QH

Governance and management

The charity is operated under the rules of its Declaration of Trust adopted 07/05/2002 and most recently amended 05/07/2011. New trustees are asked for a written recommendation from a trustworthy person and voted on by current trustees.

Aims and objectives

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  1. To assist and maintain registered charities that provide education and/or support for young people who are living on the streets, drug users and/or victims of domestic abuse and/or commercial exploitation, and that provide necessary help for the families of such people in any way deemed charitable in law;

  2. To assist and maintain registered charities that run preventative programmes for young people who are living in conditions of deprivation or who are exposed to the dangers of abuse, exploitation or addiction and that provide necessary help for the families of such young people in any way deemed charitable in law;

  3. To collate and disseminate information through all forms of media that will help , draw attention to the plight of young people described in |) and 2) whilst respecting their right to privacy and to encourage charitable action on their behalf.

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Meninadanca

Summary of the main activities undertaken for the public benefit

Meninadanga works with survivors of child sexual exploitation, abuse and human trafficking in communities along the BR-116 in Brazil, offering them a safe house and rehabilitation and by teaching protective behaviours. We use dance and other therapeutic activities, alongside the support of a team of professionals, to help them take back control of their lives. We work with the girls’ families, offering support and aiding reconciliation. Initiatives in local communities where sexual exploitation occurs help to challenge local entrenched attitudes which normalise and accept abuse and exploitation of girls. We also seek to prevent young girls from becoming victims of abuse, child sexual exploitation or trafficking by raising awareness with Brazilian authorities.

Since opening the first Pink House in Medina in 2013, Meninadanga has grown to operate five Pink Houses across a 250km stretch of the BR-1 16 motorway - Brazil’s worst road for child trafficking and sexual exploitation. The additional centres are in Candido Sales (2016), Padre Paraiso (2019), Catuji (2020), and Ponto dos Volantes (2023).

Summary of the main achievements and decisions during the period Brazil

In the 2024-2025 period, the Pink Houses supported approximately 350 girls each week, continuing to provide them with a safe, creative, and healing environment,

Each Pink House typically welcomes between 60 and 80 girls per day, across morning and afternoon sessions. Staffed entirely by local women, our team members act not only as educators and facilitators, but as trusted mentors, advocates, and lifelines for vulnerable girls affected by or at risk of sexual abuse, trafficking and exploitation.

During the year, we delivered:

We also worked closely with girls’ families and caregivers, particularly their mothers, whose participation is often instrumental in enabling long-term personal and community transformation. During 2024 our teams conducted 539 home visits.

In addition to core programming, we expanded several targeted initiatives within the Pink Houses to broaden our reach and deepen our impact. These included:

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Our commitment to influencing broader social attitudes continued through our communityfacing work. In 2024—2025, our Pink House teams organised 202 public events and performances, engaging an estimated 29,200 people with messages of empowerment, awareness, and cultural change.

Among these events was the Transforma Exhibition, now a key annual fixture. Each Pink House becomes an interactive space where art, performance, and storytelling challenge

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harmful gender norms and promote girls’ rights. In July 2024, five Transforma Exhibitions were held, attracting 2,500 visitors across our project sites.

All the Pink Houses put on their end of year performance, an artistic showcase that brings together the work developed in the year’s workshops. The event is a one-night presentation held in a public space, free of charge and open to the community. These performances took place simultaneously in all five towns and were watched by around 1,000 people.

The girls also actively participated in 72 public demonstrations and advocacy events, using their voices to call for justice, equality, and protection for girls in their communities, impacting around 19,000 people.

Our Justice Team, comprised of two lawyers, worked on:

Central coordination and operational support were provided by our team in Belo Horizonte, led by Brazilian Director Warlei Torezani. This six-person team provides training, oversight, and strategic planning for all Pink House projects.

The Meninadanga Brazil office, based in Belo Horizonte, is not only responsible for the coordination, training, and strategic support of the Pink House teams- it also plays an active role in developing local partnerships and securing national funding.

One of our key partners in 2024-2025 has been SADA, one of Brazil’s largest logistics and haulage companies. Through tax rebate incentives, SADA is providing vital funding to support the cultural programmes at two of our Pink Houses, enabling us to expand our reach and deepen community engagement through dance, theatre, and the arts.

In addition, SADA has collaborated with Meninadanca on awareness campaigns along the BR116, particularly at gas stations and truck parks — known hotspots for child sexual exploitation. These campaigns have helped raise public awareness and promote protective behaviours among truck drivers and local workers, reinforcing our mission to create a safer environment for girls along this high-risk corridor.

With Meninadanga’s growing national profile, the Belo Horizonte office is also playing an increasingly active role in representing the charity at conferences, seminars, and public events across Brazil. In 2024-2025, this included delivering a series of educational talks to employees at SADA’s headquarters in Betim, where team members raised awareness about child sexual exploitation and encouraged staff to recognise signs of abuse and take action to report it. This kind of corporate sensitisation has becomea valuable tool in extending our preventative work beyond the Pink Houses and into wider society.

The girls themselves have played a vital role in Meninadanga’s awareness-raising efforts beyond the immediate regions where we operate. In October 2024, a dance group from our Medina Pink House travelled to Belo Horizonte to perform at a creative arts event, sharing their message through movement and storytelling with a broader audience. Meanwhile, three girls from the Candido Sales Pink House represented Meninadanga at a national conference in Sao Paulo, organised by Childhood Brasil, focused on the issue of child sexual exploitation along Brazil’s highways. There, the girls not only performed but also spoke publicly about their experiences and perspectives, helping to centre survivor voices in a national conversation about prevention, protection, and policy change. Their participation is a powerful reminder that the girls we support are also leaders, advocates, and agents of change.

In parallel, advocacy and lobbying have become a key area of growth for our Brazilian operations. Over the past year, the Belo Horizonte team participated in several high-level meetings with policymakers, local government officials, and judicial representatives, drawing

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attention to the systemic failures in protecting girl victims of sexual violence. The team

actively advocated for the proper enforcement of existing laws and proposed the development of new legislation better suited to the specific vulnerabilities of girls in high-risk areas such as those along the BR-1 16. This work is critical in driving the structural change needed to complement our direct support for girls and their communities.

UK

The Meninadanga UK office, based at the Bishop’s Stortford Baptist Centre, remained the hub for our fundraising, awareness-raising, and advocacy work in the UK. We are continuing to grow our supporter base as more people hear about the cause of child trafficking on the BR116 and our work on the frontline.

Our yearly magazine was published in September 2024 and mailed to all our supporters.

2024 also saw the launch of Matt Roper’s book, Before the Night Comes, which tells the whole story of Meninadanga and was published by Mirror Books.

To accompany the launch of the book we brought a group of girls over from Brazil, alongside Pink House Candido Sales coordinator Keyla Dutra and Brazil director Warlei Torezani to perform over a two-week period in venues around the UK.

The book also led to media coverage with articles in the Daily Mirror and MailOnline, and in Premier Christianity magazine.

The charity’s’ policy on reserves

Priority is given to funding support for the projects in Brazil, keeping the equivalent of three months of Brazil grants and UK operational costs in reserve. However, throughout this period, we have continued to accrue additional reserves in anticipation of the significantly increased funds needed to run the projects and justice team as the situation in Brazil changes and the work grows and develops.

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Independent examiner’s report to the trustees of Meninadanca for the year ended 31 March 2025

We report on the accounts of the charity, which are set out on pages 6 to 8.

Respective responsibilities of trustees and examiner

The charity's trustees are responsible for the preparation of the accounts. The charity’s trustees consider that an audit is not required for this year under section |44(2) of the Charities Act 2011 (the 2011 Act) and that an independent examination is needed.

It is our responsibility to:

Basis of independent examiner’s report

Our examination was carried out in accordance with the general directions given by the Charity Commission. An examination includes a review of the accounting records kept by the charity and a comparison of the accounts presented with those records. It also includes consideration of any unusual items or disclosures in the accounts and seeking explanations from you as trustees concerning any such matters. The procedures undertaken do not provide all the evidence that would be required in an audit, and consequently no opinion is given as to whether the accounts present a ‘true and fair view’ and the report is limited to those matters set out in the statement below.

Independent examiner’s statement

In connection with our examination, no matter has come to our attention:

|. which gives us reasonable cause to believe that in any material respect the requirements:

e have not been met; or 2. to which, in our opinion, attention should be drawn in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

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Signed \ Ay’ \ Date M4 tng a
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Peter Wright, St John’s Centre, St John Street, Mansfield NG18 |QH

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Meninadanca Receipts & payments account for the year ended 31 March 2025

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|||||||||| |---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---| |2023/24|2024/25| |Receipts| |£|132,748.02|Donations|£114,549.99| |£|32,016.50|Grants/subsidies|£33,429.00| |a|3,076.35|Fundraising|£7143.80| |£|51,593.33|Web|Fundraising|£68,510.34| |£|~—15,781.49|Gift|Aid|Claim|£15,680.35| |£|1,937.50|Bank|Interest|£3123.62| |£|265.69|Sundry|£213.01| |£|237,418.88|Total|Receipts|£242,650.||| |Payments| |£|43,440.22|Wages,|Consultancy,|Tax|&|NI|£39,789.12| |£|17,739.58|Travel|and|expenses|£16,533.27| |£|59,873.00|Brazil|funding|£113,021.56| |£|31,269.00|Brazil|Justice|Funds|£0.00| |£|6,351.96|Office|and|admin|costs|£10,056.38| |£|210.93|Trustee|/|meetings|expenses|/|sundries|£143.75| |£|122.65|Bank|Charges|£164.51| |£|26,858.95|Fundraising|costs|£28,526.78| |£|305.07|Insurance|£313.60| |0|Independent|examination|£0.00| |£|186,171.36|Total|Payments|£208,549.17| |£|51,247.52|Net|receipts|/|(payments)|£34, 100.94| |é|49.08|Cash|funds|at|start|of|period|£29.08| |£|=:93,788.80|Bank funds|at|start|of period|£145,056.32| |£|93,837.88|Total|funds|at|start|of period|£145,085.40| |£|145,045.32|Bank|funds|at|end|of|period|£179,157.26| |2|29.08|Cash|funds|at|end|of period|£29.08| |£|145,085.40|Total|funds|at|end|of period|£179, 186.34|

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Meninadanca Statement of assets on 31 March 2025

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2023/24 2024/25
Cash Assets
£ 145,056 Bank accounts £ 179,157
£ 29 Petty cash £ 29
£ 145,085 Total fund £ 179,186
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These financial statements are accepted on behalf of the charity by:

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XO SF 2kth August 2025
SIE eerie i LATRIOS
David Roper, Chair of Trustees
NW) A 28th August 2025
Signed — Dated
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Simon Cole, Treasurer

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Meninadanca Notes to the accounts for the year ended 3! March 2025

I. Receipts and payment accounts

Receipts and payments accounts contain a summary of money received and money spent during the period and a list of assets and liabilities at the end of the period. Usually, cash received, and cash spent will include transactions through bank accounts and cash in hand. These accounts are prepared on a cash rather than accruals basis.

2. Grants and donations

The final instalment of a £105,000 grant over three years was made by Stewardship. With the kind permission of the donor this instalment of £30,000 went towards Pink House Operational costs as the Justice team were adequately funded at the time. A grant of £2829 was received from Brazouky Worldwide to sponsor a dance ‘teacher for the Pink Houses in Brazil and a grant of £600 was received from Mission Assist. Gift Aid for 2021 was claimed and received (£15,680) in this period.

  1. Trustees’ remuneration Trustees received no remuneration or benefits in this period.

  2. Related party transactions An international director, who is the son of the Chair of the UK charity Meninadanga is paid directly by the charity.

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