CARE

I read this news story a few months ago and cried. My heart absolutely breaks for the people suffering in East Africa. (Uplifting way to kick off a post, eh?) Earlier this year, the United Nations declared famine in six regions in the Horn of Africa. More than 13 million people are in urgent need of lifesaving humanitarian assistance. Women and children in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia have been particularly hit hard and humanitarian agencies like CARE are working around the clock to respond to the crises and save lives.

CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty. They have been rapidly scaling up their response in the Horn of Africa,  and their emergency interventions have already directly reached over a million people across the region. CARE is working alongside partners to provide food, water, health, education, protection, livelihoods, and prevention of gender-based violence in the Dadaab refugee camps.

CARE not only feeds the hungry, they also help tackle underlying causes of poverty so that people can become self-sufficient. Recognizing that women and children suffer disproportionately from poverty, CARE places special emphasis on working with women to create permanent social change. CARE also provides people in need assistance with water/sanitation/hygiene, food, education, gender-based violence, psychosocial support, and psychological counseling. In 2010, CARE worked in 87 countries around the world, supporting 905 poverty-fighting projects to reach more than 82 million people, over half of whom are women. You can learn more about what they do or search their project database.

If you make one donation this year, consider supporting a humanitarian organization like CARE. They are literally saving lives every day. Make a general donation to CARE between now and December 31 and your donation will automatically be doubled. Over 90% of funds go to help people directly through CARE programs. Make a donation for someone else and send them a CARE holiday e-card.

You can also donate by building and sending a CARE Package. This is actually really cool. You drag and drop customized gifts of empowerment into a virtual CAREpackage that will go to help poor girls and women access the resources they need to lift themselves out of poverty. Or, you can send a care package to someone else and let them choose the items they want to donate. You can also invite your friends, family, and colleagues to add items to your group CAREpackage. $12 can add a lifesaving mosquito net. $60 can provide one family with Unimix, an enriched corn and bean flour to fight malnutrition, for a month.

There are other ways you can help. Donate your cell phone through the CollectiveGood program. It’s designed to capture idle mobile phones in North America and redeploy them, solving an environmental problem, raising funds for CARE, and bridging the digital divide. Send your used mobile phone(s) with the extra batteries, charging unit, automobile power plug, case, etc. All phones will be recycled or disposed of in an environmentally responsible manner and you will receive an acknowledgement letter from CARE for your donation.