Action Against Hunger

Action Against Hunger| ACF International  is a global humanitarian organization committed to ending world hunger. The organization saves the lives of severely malnourished children and helps vulnerable communities become self-sufficient, through long-term sustainable systems.

The Numbers:

• Lifesaving impact in 40+ countries
• 5000+ field staff assisting more than 6 million people each year.
• 30+ years of expertise in contexts of conflict, disasters and food crises

Where Your Money Goes: 

93% of all funding goes towards program services. (That's $0.93 of every dollar). 4% goes to general operating and management expenses, and 3% goes to fundraising. One of the reasons fundraising costs so little, may be because there are so many, easy, ways to get involved. Donors can contribute directly via the website, shop in the organization's online store, or even use free tools through the Action Against Hunger website to create their own fundraising campaign to end hunger. 

So what does that 93% in program services look like? Well in 2012:

• 550,000 small farmers were provided with tools after drought and displacement
• 42,000 severely malnourished children in the D.R. Congo were treated
• 170,000 people gained access to clean water in Kenya

Programs:

• Nutrition: "Action Against Hunger’s methods for identifying and rescuing populations afflicted with acute malnutrition are internationally renowned, having pioneered revolutionary nutrition products and field tested treatment protocols that have become industry standards. From rural mountain villages to the confines of refugee camps to ethnically divided cities, Action Against Hunger treats and prevents malnutrition in over 40 countries around the world. [Action Against Hunger's] programs are launched most often during times of crisis and focus on the most vulnerable, including young children and women who are pregnant or nursing."

          What They Do:

• Evaluate nutritional needs: To assess the root causes of a malnutrition outbreak, ACF collects baseline data on key nutritional indicators like local capacities and resources, cultural practices, infrastructure, and geography. These nutrition surveys are essential for mounting an effective, customized response.
• Treat acute malnutrition: ACF treats cases of severe acute malnutrition with inpatient care (for those with medical complications) and with community-based, outpatient programs. Without treatment severely malnourished women and children would likely face imminent death.
• Prevent acute malnutrition: ACF’s prevention activities provide Ready-to-Use-Foods to patients discharged from therapeutic care, children with moderate acute malnutrition, and children in communities faced with seasonal hunger. Prevention can save millions of lives while long-term solutions are developed.
• Build local capacity: ACF strengthens public health systems to combat malnutrition. They field teams that consist overwhelmingly of local staff and integrate their programs into existing health structures. When crises subside, they ensure local capacity is in place to support continued improvements in communities’ nutritional health.

• Food Security & Livelihoods: "Encompassing a wide array of activities customized to meet a community’s specific needs, [Action Against Hunger's] programs are designed to bolster agricultural production, jumpstart local market activity, support micro-enterprise initiatives, and otherwise enhance a vulnerable community’s access to sustainable sources of food and income."

           What They Do:

• Evaluate local needs: To determine what’s causing hunger in a given area, Action Against Hunger carries out comprehensive evaluations by collecting and analyzing key data on local assets, resources, and livelihoods strategies. Their teams meet directly with community members to better understand local conditions and create a collaborative plan of action.
• Respond to emergencies: When disasters destroy infrastructure and food supplies, when violence forces thousands to flee, or when drought disrupts food production, Action Against Hunger responds with distributions of food, cash, and other items to prevent hunger in the short-term and ensure that crops can be replanted and livestock restocked in the future.
• Provide long-term solutions: Designed in collaboration with local populations, Action Against Hunger's strategies are context-specific: micro-grant support for families recovering from conflict; seeds and tools for agricultural recovery; livestock and veterinary services where needed; small business assistance; and other programs that help families regain self-sufficiency.

• Water, Sanitation, & Hygiene: "Every day 4,000 children die from illnesses like diarrhea, dysentery, and cholera caused by dirty water and unhygienic living conditions. [Action Against Hunger] can’t fight malnutrition without tackling the diseases that contribute to it. As part of [their] integrated approach to hunger, [they are] getting safe water, sanitation, and hygiene services to communities in need all over the world."

          What They Do:

• Provide access to safe water: During emergencies, ACF trucks water into affected areas and installs storage tanks and reservoirs. Where water is scarce or unsafe, they drill and decontaminate wells, install hand-pumps, protect natural springs, tap aquifers, rehabilitate damaged infrastructure, and pipe water into hard-to-reach villages and health centers.
• Promote sanitation & hygiene: To prevent outbreaks of disease during a crisis, ACF’s teams distribute hygiene kits and build latrines and hand-washing stations. In communities at risk, they construct water filters made from basic materials and teach healthy practices like hand-washing, cooking with clean utensils, and drawing water from protected sources.
• Ensure lasting change: ACF’s commitment to community participation ensures long-term capacity: the organization trains community-based water committees to manage their water and sanitation infrastructure themselves, and organize village health teams to model good sanitation and hygiene practices for their communities long after ACF leaves an area.

• Emergency Response: "From cholera epidemics sweeping through refugee camps, to catastrophic natural disasters, to spikes in malnutrition rates brought on by drought, Action Against Hunger responds to humanitarian emergencies all over the world, delivering immediate life-saving services to populations in distress. With emergency teams on call 24 hours a day, and pre-positioned stocks of essential supplies ready for deployment, [their] internationally renowned rapid response capabilities ensure that life-saving assistance can be delivered anywhere in the world when needs arise."

Praise:

• Four Star charity rating by Charity Navigator
• A- rated organization by Charity Watch
• 2012 Top Nonprofit by Great Nonprofits

To learn more about Action Against Hunger|ACF International please visit their website. The site is definitely worth a visit, as it provides comprehensive information on how the organization implements their program services, the organization's impact, news from the field, and of course, all the financial and reporting documents savvy funders are looking for.

Children's Futures

Children's Futures was established in 2001 to serve Mercer County, NJ, and ensure that all children and families get off to a healthy start in life. They aim to increase opportunities for health and wellness, and to ward off health and social problems that can lead to a lifetime of illness and dependency.

The organization's mission is to improve health and development outcomes for children and their families. To achieve this mission, they formally collaborate with schools, social service providers, healthcare agencies, faith institutions, civic associations, employers and others around school readiness and success strategies that have the greatest positive impact on children's immediate health needs, as well as long-term development.

Children's Futures provides services in the following areas:

• Health Education and Outreach
• Prenatal Care Services
• Nurse Home Visiting
• Case Management
• Quality Child Care
• Health Literacy
• Family Support Services
• Professional Training & Technical Assistance

Additionally, the organization hosts conferences and forums, provides training and technical assistance to area agencies, produces reports and advocates for policy changes. Their programs focus on: strengthening parenting, improving primary care systems, improving child care systems and integrating community support.

For more information please visit the Children's Futures website.

Kitechild

Kitechild works to elevate the standard of care for orphaned children through sustainable micro-projects. The Kitechild network, with more than 35 orphanages in 11 countries, is grounded in long-term solutions, transparency, and efficiency, so they are able to achieve visible and measurable results in the well-being of the child.

Launched in 2010, by two UCLA graduates, the organization envisioned using the power of the internet in the age of social media to provide a unified solution to many of the challenges orphanages face while providing resources and opportunities to orphans in the developing world.

Kitechild's programs support orphanages that adopt a hands-on approach to child care as opposed to the traditional large institutional format. The organization aims to help its members overcome some of the challenges facing orphanages and threatening the well-being and healthy development of each child. The challenges include:

• The cost of supplying energy. Kitechild's sustainable micro-projects promote development of renewable sources of energy and the reduction of energy consumption.
• Orphanages are severely understaffed: the average ration is 15 children per adult, (the ideal is 5 child per adult). Kitechild works with field partners to facilitate training in best practices.
• The lack of transparency in running and managing homes makes it difficult for donors and benefactors to see where their funds are being allocated and how they can create long-term change. Kitechild requires in-depth project proposals and media feedback so donors can see the direct impact of their of their contributions.
• Orphanage directors lack knowledge of how to attract support and exposure to their efforts or they lack the time to do it. Kitechild uses free mediums like social media networks and the Kitechild Network to promote the efforts of its orphanage members to potential donors, volunteers, and corporate sponsors.

The following programs address these challenges:

• Online Sustainable Projects: uses existing networks to obtain funding for sustainable micro-projects featured on their homepage. They work closely with orphanage partners to develop these projects, then use online promotion and marketing to fund them. Projects focus on: food security, income generation, self-sufficiency, and community caretaker training.
• Inspiration Series: aims to expose at-risk foster youth in local LA County to potential careers in the arts through unique interactive events.
• Leather Bands for Learning: partnering with Lucky Flirts Jewelry, every bracelet purchased raises money to contribute to the educational costs of the orphans in the Kitechild Network, (tuition, uniforms, books).

Kitechild's blog is fully of impact stories, which I highly recommend reading. Potential donors are able to review profiles on each orphanage in the network, so contributions can be directed to specific orphanages and projects.  

For more information on this great organization, please visit Kitechild's website.

Smile Squared

'Rethink what and why you buy.'

In summer 2010, Eric Cope and his wife went to Central America on humanitarian mission. There they discovered how the lack of sufficient dental hygiene impacts a child's life. From this experience, Smile Squared was born.

The mission of Smile Squared is to give every child the health and confidence that comes with clean teeth. For every toothbrush purchased, another toothbrush in donated to a child in need. They believe even small everyday products, like toothbrushes, can have a big impact on the world. The company's goal is to offer practical, sustainable solutions to help improve the overall health and educational needs of children around the world.

Smile Squared encourages everyone to "think about the products we buy: Where will this product end up when I'm done with it? Is it a fair trade product? BPA free? Can my purchase have a direct impact on someone else who needs it?"

The website and concept are pretty simple. You can buy an child or adult size toothbrush ($5.95 each), and for every toothbrush purchased, another is donated. The toothbrushes feature 100% biodegradable bamboo handles and come in a 100% recyclable box.

What I particularly like is their option to purchase toothbrushes and have your purchase(s) donated as well. May of the companies I've researched have some very compelling causes they are supporting, and I'm often disappointment that I can't just donate 100%. Smile Squared allows you to do just that. Imagine how great a change $5.95 can make.


Here's what Eric Cope had to say:

"I never set out to have a toothbrush business, but felt compelled to start Smile Squared after volunteering at a dental clinic in Guatemala in 2010. Needless to say, teaching children how to brush their teeth, seeing painful and preventable issues in their mouths, and realizing this lack of oral hygiene contributed to bigger issues (overall health and even self-esteem; kids were too ashamed to smile). Many of these kids didn't have access to a toothbrush, and there were some that shared theirs with family members.   It struck me that a basic necessity like a toothbrush, is truly a luxury item to many in this world.  I just wanted to do something about it, and thought that creating a sustainable for-profit business was more of a long term solution than simply donating toothbrushes.   We feel blessed to work with GREAT non-profits like International Justice Mission, Buckner International, Save Their Smiles, Give Kids A Smile, Feed The Children and Save The Children (Hurricane Sandy relief) to name a few.  Since 2010, our donated toothbrushes have been (or will soon be) distributed in the US, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Haiti, Uganda, Kenya, Cambodia, Philippines, Columbia, Peru, and Dominican Republic. This is certainly something to smile about."

For more information, please visit Smile Squared.

Schoolbags for Kids

Schoolbags for Kids was founded by Kalon Gutierrez and Luis Garcia, with the mission to equip children around the world with the supplies they need to empower themselves through education. They believe every child deserves to have the tools to learn and succeed. So for each schoolbag purchased from Schoolbags for Kids, the company donates a yellow schoolbag with supplies to a child in need.

So why the yellow bags? Well, yellow is the international symbol for caution that signals motorists to slow down and yield as they drive.  Most children benefiting from Schoolbags for Kids donations walk miles, on dangerous roads, to get to school.

Right now donations are being sent to the following organizations:

• Holy Cross School, Belize
• Homes of Home Orphanage, India
• Baan Rang Kratai School, Thailand

Schoolbags for Kids Partnership with:

• Ecojot for donations to Haiti
• Books and Beyond Project for donations to Rwanda

I asked founder Luis Garcia if there was any option for consumers to simply donate purchased schoolbags. Here's what he said:  

"Our $10 "One There" schoolbag was put on our site after a customer contacted us stating he didn't have children of his own but wanted to send a schoolbag to help a kid in need. Since then we have many customers add a "One There" schoolbag to their order or just order several "One There: schoolbags. Currently, for every five "One There" schoolbags purchased, we send you a mini "One There" schoolbag as a Thank you. This way [customers] can show their support for the mission."

Please visit Schoolbags for Kids for more information about this great company. 

If You Give a Kid a Book

BookEnds

In 1993, 8-year-old Brandon Keefe believed he could make a difference. By 1998, he was, forming BookEnds as nonprofit organization in Southern California that is about kids helping kids. The organization recycles children's books through student-run book drives and places them in schools and youth organizations in need of books. They believe that a literate child is the foundation of a thriving community. By providing access to books, children are given the resources to develop literacy skills and to experience the joy and imagination of reading.

Recipients of the BookEnds program include:

• Inner City Schools
• Youth Centers
• Homeless Shelters
• Family Literacy Centers
• After-school Enrichment Programs
• Children's Group Homes
• Juvenile Detention Facilities

For recipient organizations the ratio of books to kids is 3 to 1; the national average is 22 to 1.  Each dollar donated to BookEnds results in more than five dollars worth of books for kids.

BookEnds believes in the power of community service. Through Bookends students have the opportunity to change their lives and the lives of others through community service. Student volunteers collect, sort and personally deliver donated books to quality libraries and inspire a passion for reading.

The Stats to Date:

• 22,000 student volunteers
• 585 empty libraries filled in the Greater Los Angeles area
• 2.1 million books delivered
• Serving over 520,000 at-risk children

For more information please visit BookEnds.

Gifts Making a Difference

Suitcases4Kids is dedicated to helping foster children move with dignity, one suitcase at a time.

History

In 1995 10-year-old Aubyn Burnside had a great idea. Burnside had recently discovered that the average child in foster care has to move three or four times and they carry everything they own in garbage bags."I thought it was horrible that the children had nothing to carry their things in as they moved so many times. I wanted to make them feel special by giving them something of their own," Burnside explained. It wasn't long before the media picked up on the story. Burnside even made an appearance on Oprah and was named one of Oprah's Young Angels of her Angel Network.

A New Chapter

By 2009 the project was all but defunct as Burnside had directed her attention towards other endeavors. Enter Ron Nickerson. He is the founder and president of Suitcases4Kids*, having decided to use his talents and contacts to help children in the foster care system. It was during his research to determine how to best channel his talents that Nickerson discovered Burnside's project and realized it was a perfect fit to accomplish his goals. Nickerson has spent the last 25-years working with children and their families in a variety of settings including residential facilities and psychiatric hospitals. He has also been a social worker for kids in specialized foster care and director of a 30 bed youth detention facility in Boston. Currently Nickerson is a foster dad to several boys with Reactive Attachment Disorder. 

Some Stats

• Number of children in the United States foster care system: over 463,000 (as of 01/2010) 
• Average length of stay in foster care: 27.2 months. 
• Number of children waiting for adoption: 125,535
• Number of children abused or neglected: 742,661

For more information on the organization and how you can help please visit the Suitcases4Kids website.

*Please note the name of the organization Aubyn Burnside founded is Suitcases for Kids. You can visit the organization's site here. (The site has not been updated in several years).

Homeless Children's Playtime Project

Founded in 2003,  Homeless Children's Playtime Project (HCPP) is dedicated to nurturing healthy childhood development and reducing the trauma of children living in temporary housing programs in Washington D.C. The organization also promotes affordable housing.

The organization's vision states, "We believe that play is a human right that all children deserve, regardless of housing status. We seek to help create a city that provides every opportunity for homeless children to succeed by advocating for affordable housing and safe shelters for all families."

HCPP's trained volunteers from the community provide children in emergency shelters and transitional housing with arts and educational activities, healthy snacks, sports and recreation, special events, and bicycle, equipment, and toy drives.

In the past five years, 200 volunteers have served more than 500 children at six playtime sites in Washington D.C.

I urge you to visit HCPP's website for more information on how you can get involved.