Senator Andrew Bartlett
Monday, January 17, 2005
 
Tsunami Aid: a grass-roots Sri Lankan group to donate to
If any of you are concerned about giving money to any large aid agency because of the overheads, I got an email from a friend of mine who has worked in villages in Sri Lanka.

If you are wanting every cent of your money to go straight to the grassroots, you may wish to consider the following group. Because I know the person involved, I can totally vouch for their credibility and reliability. Her name is Nicky Hungerford and (among many other things) she has previously worked in Sri Lanka for an organisation called the Rural Women’s Organisation Network (RWON) and has maintained strong links with that group and with the region. This small group worked in 30 villages in the Galle region – 15 of them were fishing villages and these have been terribly damaged by the tsunami on Boxing Day - in some of them up to 80% of the people were killed and all infrastructure gone.

The aim of RWON is to empower women, which was done through several ways:

  • a small revolving loans project to encourage women to set up small cottage industries;
  • training workshops in a variety of things such as making coconut broom, pappadums, soap etc – whatever the women were keen to learn and would help them make some money;
  • education programs on issues such as domestic violence, AIDS etc;
  • running 6 preschools.

This group is run by poor rural women for rural women and has been very successful in making women’s lives better. Rural people are the poor of the poor in Sri Lanka and poverty is endemic.

Following the Tsunami, RWON are starting two new projects.

  • Firstly to help people rebuild their houses
  • And secondly to help people start earning some money again.

Nicky is fundraising for RWON and all the money she raises will go directly to RWON and directly to the families of the villages in the severely affected areas. Information that she has received from RWON suggests that red tape is stopping or slowing down the flow of money already donated.

A bank account has been set up specifically for her to receive donations to RWON and all money will be forwarded directly to RWON. PLEASE NOTE: although you will be sent a receipt (filled out by an unpaid volunteer) donations are NOT tax deductible.

I won’t post bank account details on this site, but if you want more details on how to donate, you can email Nicky on campaign@cafnec.org.au or send her a cheque (made out to N.Hungerford) at PO Box 323N, North Cairns Qld 4870.

I might post an update on what is being done with the funds in a month or two.


posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Monday, January 17, 2005 Permalink
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