photo | Steve Floyd

Social Venture Partners Minnesota (SVP) recently hosted The Engaged Philanthropy Conference at the Graves 601 Hotel in Minneapolis. The Engaged Philanthropy Conference brought social entrepreneurs together with philanthropists, investors and business leaders. “The social problems that we face will require the collaboration of nonprofits, philanthropy and business to solve – no one of those sectors can do it by themselves,” states Brad Brown, Executive Director of SVP Minnesota. SVP was founded in 1997 by Paul Brainerd in Seattle, Washington in order to build a philanthropic network that invests money and expertise in social entrepreneurial ventures. The members of SVP do much more than write checks, they also offer their time and expertise to the ventures they support. Read the rest of this entry »

Photographer Alexander Zoltai submitted this article.

Photo | Alexander ZoltaiCoffee production in Guatemala is a timeless process. For the most part, coffee farmers produce coffee the same way their grandfathers did. It is a long, arduous and beautiful process.

The problem associated with coffee production in Guatemala lies in the small amount that farmers receive for a very labor-intensive product. Fewer that six families are responsible for the majority of coffee production in Guatemala, a monopoly on coffee that allows the families to dictate the price of coffee in the country. Read the rest of this entry »

Roughly 1,600 homeless people live in Ramsey County alone. The magnitude of homelessness is so great that we often accept it because facing the problems and questions that homelessness presents can be overwhelming. Personally, I know I have walked by homeless people and thought, what can I do? Or tried to avoid eye contact because the pain is too real, and the solutions too obscure. How can we solve such a problem? Read the rest of this entry »

photo | justi griersonIssue 01 | ONE
Writer: Liz Werner
Photographer: Candice Towell

Timon Bondo is hard to miss with his bigger-than-life smile, hearty laugh and effervescent spirit. Though lighthearted in most aspects of his life, Timon is serious about helping the children of Rabondo, Kenya, a small subsistence farming community where he grew up. Fraught with AIDS, poverty and a sense of hopelessness for the past decade, Rabondo is experiencing dramatic change because Timon is taking action.

Timon may not be whom you picture when you think of a hero. While his story carries a legacy of heroic proportions, Timon himself is an unlikely superman. Unsure of his actual age due to a lack of accurate birth records, Timon estimates that he is somewhere between 65 and 85 years old. His youth is not the only thing slipping away; he has been losing his eyesight for the past 10 years and now is almost totally blind. So how, then, did an aging and ailing man almost single-handedly restore a sense of hope to a village that is nearly 8,000 miles from where he sits today? Admittedly, Timon acknowledges that he is neither a genius nor a millionaire. Determination, patience and a vision of education were the guiding and abiding lights of Timon’s efforts as his programs continue to strengthen and save Rabondo’s children and community. Read the rest of this entry »

Timon Bondo.This article was contributed by Timon Bondo, founder of Rabondo Community Project USA, as an update on its progress.

Gifts of time, money and kind thoughts have contributed to the revitalization of the Rabondo Village in ways that I could not have imagined ten years ago. In fact, we have just built two new classrooms earlier this year. Read the rest of this entry »

Children stand with Ben Wilson in Vietnam.DANANG, VIETNAM
Amazing, exhausting, and heart-warming: that’s how I would describe my week visiting the programs conducted by Children of Vietnam (COV), the Children’s Culture Connection-represented charity that supports Vietnamese children in need.

Children of Vietnam, which just celebrated its 10th anniversary, was started by a man named Ben Wilson as he was facing retirement after a long corporate career. According to Ben, he didn’t play golf and was worried that he wouldn’t have enough to do to keep busy. So, at 65 years old, he started COV.

After seeing how many ways his organization is impacting the lives of children in need, I can confidently say that Ben does NOT need to worry about being bored. Read the rest of this entry »

This article was cross-posted from (BLOG)RED.

(RED) was created by Bono and Bobby Shriver to raise awareness and money for The Global Fund by teaming up with the world’s most iconic brands to produce (PRODUCT)RED-branded products. A percentage of each (PRODUCT)RED product sold is given to The Global Fund, to invest in African AIDS programs, with an emphasis on women and children. Members of the (RED) community are doing amazing things to inspire friends, family, co-workers and neighbors to take action and exercise the power of (RED). Here’s one story that takes the concept of shouting (RED) from the mountain top to a whole new level…. Read the rest of this entry »

Pepe Wonosikou, founder of the Numan School Project, enjoys some time with a young student in Numan, Nigeria.The Numan School Project is an organization working to furnish schools in Numan, Nigeria with the tools necessary to provide a quality education to students. Founded in 2007 by 32-year-old Numan native Pepe Wonosikou, the organization aims to accommodate over 200 students with everything they need for a proper learning environment. These needs include plumbing, windows, doors, desks, chairs, books, blackboards, and uniforms (to name a few).

NEED caught up with Pepe Wonosikou for a conversation about Numan, Nigeria and the hopes she has for her project.

Q: How long did you live in Nigeria, and why did you leave it?

A: I moved to the United States in 1991. My father moved here to pursue his graduate studies at Luther Seminary. Read the rest of this entry »

Couples can create their own registry that describes the causes they support.Gift-giving is intended as a means of celebration, so why does shopping often feel like a chore? This act of generosity often gets bogged down by expectations, guess-work and price tags. Thankfully, there is an alternative solution and you don’t even have to go searching very far. Changing The Present is a nonprofit website that serves as a resource for socially responsible gifts. Their site allows individuals to search for a meaningful cause of their choice and allows them to make a donation on another’s behalf. Shoppers can browse an online catalogue for a gift that is sure to make a real difference in the world, leaving both the giver and the receiver feeling satisfied. Whether a contribution is made towards women’s rights, world health or any other cause, it redefines the sense of purpose that comes with gift-giving. Read the rest of this entry »

David duChemin, a photographer based in Vancouver, submitted this story.

A mother in DRC with her child. The mother is HIV+ but her child, thanks to WV intervention, is not.In a world of growing poverty it is easy to become cynical about efforts to help. In three years as a photographer serving the international humanitarian community I have often been asked whether the organizations I shoot for are doing the good work they claim to. I am by nature cynical and when I started this career I feared the work would only fuel that tendency. There are days on the field when it resurfaces, when the lack of resources and the over-worked field-staff make me angry at the world and cynical about a great many things, but it’s been a constant surprise to me that my work for groups like World Vision has been the antidote to my cynicism, and a source of hope to me.

My primary work for World Vision Canada is the Christmas Gift Catalogue. Responsible for raising millions of dollars each year, this catalogue has sent me to Malawi twice, Uganda twice, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ecuador, El Salvador, Dominican Republic, and most recently Mongolia. The images we gather for this project are a long way from the distended bellies and flies around the eyes that were the mainstay of fundraising images several years ago; instead they reflect the hope and dignity of the children and families we work with, and the joy they experience when given a step up. These assignments are the highlights of my year. Read the rest of this entry »