Tag Archives: charity

<3 Links, quotes and comments of the week

14 Dec

Yep, that's Brad Pitt

  • GiveWell.org has announced their top reviewed charities in time for Christmas. These guys are very detailed (obsessive) in the way they review charities – their blog makes for interesting reading. They even keep a running list of mistakes they’ve made on their front page. Interesting GiveDirectly which gives cash grants directly to households in Kenya made their top charities list, as did a microfinance organisation. This is interesting because GiveWell had previously stated they were highly uncertain of microfinance as a concept. Pratham which my cousin’s charity partners with in India also made the list.
  • As part of my 40 year mission I’ve been thinking about how people make the decision to give to charity. Sascha Dichter posted some interesting thoughts this week: “…simply giving people information about a charity’s overhead costs makes them less likely to donate to it. This held true, remarkably, even if the information was positive and indicated and the charity was extremely efficient.” He suggests that this is because generosity and analytics are not linked – once we start thinking about HOW we’re going to spend our money – nothing is ever “good enough, impactful enough, scalable enough, anything enough”. He suggests overcoming our analytical minds by committing to donate a particular amount each year. Then we can get as analytical about how we spend that money as we like.
  • And from an expats evening in Iloilo City: “Why would you try and move a woman to Iloilo? It’s like taking coal to a coal mine” and “Coming to Iloilo is like turning into a kind of Brad Pitt -  a Brad Pitt who has $100 bills falling out of his pockets”. To put things in context, I was apparently the first female expat to ever turn up on her own. It’s certainly a colourful city!

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What are you guys thinking about the new threeish-links-to-love series? Let me know in the comments or at moniquealfris-at-gmail [dot] com.

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On my birthday and the Thanksgiving Challenge

20 Nov

As part of this whole having a 40 year mission thing, I’ve been interested in what it means to actually give.

Part of what started me thinking about this was Sascha Dichter’s generosity experiment, where he decided to say YES to everyone for a set period of time. He decided on a month – and ended up with some great insights. Including how Seth Godin hilariously asked him for money, knowing that Sascha couldn’t say no.

Sascha took this experiment and turned it into “Generosity Day” – which happened for the first time on Valentine’s Day of this year. People were asked to say “YES to everything that is asked of you, all day long”. And knowing that Generosity Day is a very personal thing, and very difficult to “talk about it without having experienced it”, Sascha has announced a warm up to Generosity Day 2012 – the Thanksgiving Challenge.

Try it next week, for the week or just for one day.  Consider it your Generosity Day Dry Run, so that you can speak with gusto and authenticity when the big day arrives.

So what am I going to do?

I’m going to use my birthday on Thursday (LOVE birthdays!) to say YES to absolutely everyone that asks. And for the rest of this week I’m going to say YES to the first price offered by every local driver here in the Philippines.

(More of a relief than anything else, I assure you!)

In addition, my family have been asking what they can give me. It’s trickier for them than normal this year – they’re in Australia, I’m in the Philippines and my kindle is in Cambodia (long story).

Perfect I thought. This year I’m going to pick a charity for my Birthday AND Christmas presents.

And so which charity?

I spent some time looking around Give Well’s page – these guys are obsessed with finding top quality charities – but noted that they are just about to release new recommendations for the year.

And I also realise that part of the purpose of Generosity Day is not just about rationale – it’s also about emotion.

I have always been deeply affected by human trafficking – not least since reading the beautiful but terrifying Sold by Patricia McCormick and spending time with World Education and other friends who work with trafficked women in Nepal.

And then this from the NY Times grabbed me this morning. The personal sacrifice astounds and inspires me. (Update: an even better article is here)

This year, I’m asking my family to donate to the Somaly Mam Foundation – I’m also going to try and visit them when I travel to Cambodia in a month’s time.

(And as my gift back to my family – YES, here is a tax deductible alternative, should that be how they choose to give).

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As a side note – words which echo my sentiment on on why a mission is better than a plan

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On having a mission – Part 3

17 Oct

Over the last couple of weeks I have been writing about having a mission.

As part of this I am going to give away a substantial amount to charities which work with poor communities. I’m thinking along the lines of AUD$10K. Maybe more, maybe less.

Firstly, how did I come up with $10K?

I was very seriously considering doing a three month whitewater guiding course this year, before I got the job with Good Return. I figure if I could spend over $10K whitewater kayaking, I can spend $10K on the poor.

(Also part of the reason I didn’t do it was because I realised you could build a school in the middle east for around $10K).

And why I am not donating to environmental causes?

I’ve spent the last 5 years working in sustainability – I figure its time poverty got a look in.

So this post is about asking for help. I feel conflicted on who and how I should give.

I could give to many charities or, I could give to just a few.

I could go for the return-on-investment approach where I try and get value out of every single last dollar? This might be investing in Plan International who give out malaria medication, bed nets and condoms. They are reported as having the lowest life saved to dollar spent ratio.

Or, conversely, I could go for the ‘people in the third world deserve dignity’ approach of Paul Farmer and Partners in Health. Everyone deserves access to the same healthcare, regardless of the cost.

I could go for the individual approach. This might include microfinance. Where I could loan out my money over and over again to budding entrepreneurs in the third world. Like the organisation I work for – Good Return. Or perhaps the sponsor a child approach.

I could go for the wider research and development approach and give to a group like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

One idea I have been toying with is the idea of starting something myself. My money will not go as far, but perhaps I will learn more and be able to contribute more in the future because of it.

How have you given before? How did you decide who to give to?

Or maybe rather, if I gave you $10K to give to poor communities, how would you give it?

–> You can now also read Part 1 and Part 2.

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On having a mission – Part 2 (and on taking the first step)

10 Oct

Last week I posted on having a mission.

OK, so actually I posted on what the mission would be like. And how long it can take.

And how I wanted my first step to be about understanding.

1.       What does it actually mean to be poor?

I am struggling with the concept of purchasing power parity and poverty lines. And what the term “less than $2 per day” actually means.

So you wake up in the morning. You can only buy or grow food equivalent to the amount of food that you could buy for US$2 in the United States.

What does this mean for your day? What does this mean for your children? Your health? Your house?

I have been told that someone like me can never understand. Perhaps this is true. But poverty is also in my blood, in my family’s story-telling and heritage. Both sets of grandparents were exceptionally poor as children.

And besides, how can you even begin to fathom what is going on if you are not prepared to listen?

2.       What has been done about poverty so far?

I’ve been reading for a little while.

A couple of favourites – The Blue Sweater (Thanks Jo and At!). More than Good Intentions. And I just finished Mountains Beyond Mountains, recommended to me by the brilliant Alex and Josh.

Amazing, amazing, amazing.

I want to learn and see more.

3.       Why is it that people are still living in poverty?

Of course part of the answer to this question lies with the poor. Perhaps I will get some answers out of part (1).

But part of the answer also lies with those who are not.

I also just finished “The Life You Can Save” by Peter Singer. In essence he makes a very strong argument that it is unethical to not help the poor with just about everything you have.

And now.

Just on giving, some inspiration:

  • I have a friend (who doesn’t like his name) who gives 10% of his income every year to charity. (Post-tax I was told to tell anyone who asked). When asked by his girlfriend if he would stop giving money once they had a mortgage, he said something along the lines of this: “I don’t think poor people would care that I had a mortgage”.
  • Sasha Dichter’s generosity experiment – he said yes to anyone that asked him for money for a month.
  • The 50% League – to qualify members must have given away at least half their wealth, or for the past three years, half their income.

I want to understand why these are special cases, why it is that we do not give more.

I have spent a long time studying a very well off first world person who cared but was ambivalent about giving.

(For those of you playing at home, that would be me).

Now I want to study what it means to give.

4.       What I should do next

This is going to take a little time.

Would it be better to go back to well paid work and give away most of my salary?

Maybe it will be best to forget the mission and just not ever fly again? I could give the money away AND reduce the most significant part of my global carbon footprint.

And just on that, how is the environment and flexitarianism going to fit into all of this?

The plan, so far at least

On what it means to be poor, I’ll be travelling across the Asia Pacific for the next year with Good Return surveying microfinance clients for our renewable energy product. In the Philippines that means taking out a 6 month loan for a AUD$40 solar panel and LED light.

On what has been done so far, I’m going to read more (book suggestions very, very welcome).

And on why it is that people are still living in poverty, I am going to start to learn what it means to give. I’m still hashing this out, but I’m thinking over the next 12 months I am going to:

  • Spend some time saying yes – Sasha Dichter style. (Here is one right now – “Yes”).
  • Give away a substantial sum to charities which work with poor communities.

I am definitely going to need help on the last one – more on this and how I came up with the figure next week.

And on what to do next?

Hah! I’m still taking it day-by-day.

–> You can now also read Part 1 and Part 3

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On having a mission – Part 1

3 Oct

This is my scariest post so far, right before this one a few weeks ago.

Like the last one, this one took many edits and a while to post.

Many changes of tack until I got to an approach which began to look acceptable. So now, it is actually 3 posts.

And despite these editsI keep thinking, what if I’ve got it wrong? What happens if I change my mind?

What if I fail?

Actually I already know I am going to fail.

Actually, I hope to have the strength to fail many times. To be completely broken.

So here it is.

Thoughts on a mission for life which is not yet fully resolved.

Phrases which seem to make sense at the moment are “contribution”. “Global”. “Sustainability”. And most of all “poverty”.

I don’t know exactly what this means yet or how it is going to work.

When I was in Ghana I met an amazing woman who was building a vocational training centre for unemployed youth in the far west of the country. She was directing the whole thing and using funds from a small province in Canada.

She was 67.

In 40 years I’ll be 67.

So I’m giving myself 40 years to make this happen. To figure out what it means. I figure just like anything else in life it will take practice. So I just need to work at it a little every day.

There will be many steps.

But I want my first to be to begin to understand.

To understand what it means to be poor.

To understand what has been done so far.

And to understand why it is that it has not been enough.

To help me understand more of what I should do next, and why.

As part of all this I’m going to start giving a substantial amount this year to charities which work in poor communities.

I’m going to need to some help with the how and who.

More on this soon.

—> You can read now also read Part 2 and Part 3

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