Step One: advice

The first thing I needed to do to stand a chance of getting Cambaid going was to get some advice. On a nice weekend (yep, the sun did actually shine) in July, I was at a garden party for Tamwed, a charity run by a local man to support communities and projects in Tamil Nadu, South India. I had been thinking about launching a charity but with no experience I considered it to be impossible. I had to get some advice and here was a local charity that gives aid to an area and cause not unlike Cambodia (Tamwed's website is www.tamwed.org).
Afterwards I contacted the man who runs it (not single-handedly but it was, and still is, definitely his baby), Oz, to ask for advice: where on earth should I start?

He was fantastic; he gave me shed-loads of advice and after a meeting with him I had a few clear objectives and, for the first time, focus.

Firstly, I needed to establish:
1. An overall aim,
2. A few objectives that will help achieve the aim,
3. A need,
4. A structure.

Sounds easy enough? I produced the following:

Overall aim (very provisional)
To ensure orphaned children in Cambodia get a good high-school education and receive adequate healthcare.

Objectives
[Short term – Long term]

1. Raise £800 by the end of 2007 (this is enough to financially support ten children in a Cambodian orphanage to go to high school in 2008).
2. Communicate closely with the orphanage to understand what is needed.
3. Increase the number of children supported through education every year.
4. Offer financial support to other local NGO’s who need it.
5. Find other suitable benefactors to offer financial aid (i.e. local people who are not part of an organisation).
6. Create a self-sustainable orphanage in Cambodia (hopefully more than one).
7. Take volunteers over to help.

Wider Objectives

8. Promote ‘responsible tourism’
9. Raise awareness
10. Encourage the British government to teach cultural and social awareness on a wider, more global scale within British schools.
11. No money spent on administration, 100% of donations to go straight to where it is needed.

Need
Cambodia’s past echoes still today. There are over 50,000 orphans in Cambodia. Most cannot afford an education – the majority of orphanages are over-subscribed and under-funded. Many do not receive aid or sponsorship and rely solely on donations and volunteers. Educating the children is a problem as the costs are too great for the orphanages to afford. Healthcare is also a big problem: there are several epidemics in Cambodia and healthcare is expensive and generally very inadequate.

Structure
Initially I would try to gain as much financial support as possible. This would probably involve a trust fund that would gather money in the UK and transfer it to the benefactor, initially Lighthouse orphanage.

Oz has helped me evolve all of this. I now have a few main aims to get the charity going.
Firstly, I need to establish a link with Lighthouse. This will involve a lot of research into how the orphanage is run. This is mainly for the assurance of my donors and members as well as the Charity Commission, when it comes to registering. I will also need to find an independent person in Cambodia who can audit the orphanage to ensure donations are being spent wisely.
I also need to establish a structure including a chairman, a treasurer, a secretary (me) and some trustees. I will also need a membership base. The chairman is the public figurehead and will not necessarily be involved in the running of the charity, the treasurer will handle the finance and administrative side of things and the secretary will basically run the show. The trustees will then have a say in how the charity is run. There must be regular minuted meetings.

Sounds like a lot of hard work. It is, but with a lot of enthusiasm, a lot of help and a lot of hard work it is definitely possible. For the time being I plan to research, make as many contacts and friends as possible, raise money to send over and build some momentum.

Excitingly I have a contact in the US and in Canada who are keen to create a charity over there so Cambaid could, one day, be international.

Blimey. There's a long, long way to go, though.

And I've got to work first-thing so I'm hitting the hay.

Cheers for reading.