Poverty Alleviation by China Women's Development Foundation

　　【Overview】 In 2009, under the leadership of the Fifth Council and the coordination of women's federations at all levels, with support from loving enterprises and people from all circles of society, in accordance with the requirements of the scientific development concept and the government’s major decision of "ensuring economic growth, people's livelihood and maintaining stability", China Women’s Development Foundation (hereinafter referred to as "Foundation") gave full play to its advantage as a women welfare organization, innovated ideology and was bond in practices, did solid work and made breakthrough in tackling problems and new progress in fundraising, project implementation, propaganda, mobilization and team construction. It further improved the mechanism for contacting grass-roots cadres and sent more than 130 people to conduct surveys in the grass-roots units. Based on the practical needs of women at different stages, it timely designed and launched women’s public activities to help women solve problems.

　　The Foundation made a positive contribution to helping solve the problem of drinking water, health assistance, education, training, helping needy student, disaster relief and post-disaster reconstruction. The coverage of its public welfare projects keeps expanding and, as of November 2009, the projects had directly benefited more than 6 million women.

　　In the context of the international financial crisis, domestic and international corporate donations were reduced. All the staffs of the Foundation explored new fund-raising methods to expand the scale of fund-raising and raised a much larger amount of fund over 2008, greatly enhancing the performance. Especially the establishment of "Boyou Foundation" created a record of the largest amount of single contribution since the founding of China Women's Development Foundation. As of the end of November 2009, a total of 154 million Yuan of donations were raised in cash or in kind, 19.88% up over 2008; of which 105 million Yuan was already transferred to the designated account, accounting for 68.36% of the donation income that year; 49 million Yuan was material donation, accounting for 31.64% of the donation income that year, achieving the goal of fund-raising of 100 million Yuan ahead of schedule. In addition, the total expenditure in cash was 73.815 million Yuan and the expenditure in kind was 39.057 million Yuan. The administration fee was 1.6546 million Yuan, accounting for 1.44% of the total expenditure, which is in compliance with the relevant provisions of the "Foundation Management Regulations".

　　In 2009, it was awarded as the "Model Advanced Collective under the State Council in National Unity", "Advanced Grass-roots Party Organization of ACWF" and other honorary titles. The project office of "Water Cellar for Mothers" was awarded the "National Women's Civilized Post".

　　【Commonweal project implementation and management】 It continued to play its social foundation as a charity organization, built a platform for the public and enterprises to participate in philanthropy and promoted the performing of social responsibility of another batch of businesses. Meanwhile, it had 25 new company partners and signed about 49 continued or new project contracts. There was a steady increase in public participation.

　　In 2009, the commonweal projects of the Foundation continued the good development trend and made new progress in operation model, implementation scale, brand building, etc. The project departments of the Foundation respectively summarized the implementation status of each project in 2009.

　　【Water Cellar for Mothers】Under the personal instructions of Chen Zhili, Vice Chairman of the NPC Standing Committee and President of All-China Women's Federation, Huang Qingyi, Vice President and First Party Secretary of All-China Women's Federation, and Meng Xiaosi and Zhen Yan, Vice Presidents and Party Secretaries of All-China Women's Federation, through  consultation with the Ministry of Water Resources, the Foundation included the project of Water Cellar for Mothers into the national rural water conservancy development programs: "National Rural Drinking Programme (2010-2013)", "National Small-scale Irrigation Development Programme" and "National Rainwater Harvesting and Utilization Programme". The use of funds is tied up with the utilization of government funds and the working mechanism for the joint implementation of "Water Cellar for Mothers" was established. They jointly issued the "Notice on the Joint Construction of ‘Water Cellar for Mothers’ ”, laying a foundation for the construction of pilot projects for cooperation in "Water Cellar for Mothers" in 2010. Meanwhile, the construction of the "Water Cellar for Mothers" 1 +5 Project was further promoted, which played an important role in promoting the construction of new countryside.

　　【Health Express for Mothers】Under the support and guidance of leaders at all levels, the Foundation seized the opportunity to conduct coordination and mobilization, signed a donation agreement for Health Express for Mothers worth 160 million Yuan, established Boyou Foundation and 46.65 million Yuan was transferred to the designated account according to the agreement. It sent nearly 400 vehicles to 13 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in the central and western regions like Sichuan, Xinjiang and Tibet to support the grassroots hospitals and maternal and child care service centres. Through carrying out health aid, volunteer medical consultation promotion, gynecological examinations and other activities, it provided the poor women with "healthy philosophy, health knowledge and health care services". The project covered nearly 400 poor counties in the central and western regions. Meanwhile, jointly with the relevant enterprises, it carried out women health support and health education activities and explored experience in the implementation of pilot projects in large-scale high-quality private hospitals.

　　【Small-amount loan for poverty alleviation】 As of the end of September 2009, the total amount of small loan for poverty alleviation exceeded 30 million Yuan and a total of more than 100 million Yuan was invested with repayment rate of 98% or more, covering the country's 21 provinces and autonomous regions. By expanding the implementation model of "company + base + farmers", it constantly improved the benefits of the project. The project further optimized the management processes, established a mechanism for experts to participate in project identification, developed a financial security system to ensure the project's social benefits and the repayment rate of circulation funds; through field visits and data collection, it conducted investigation and research to actively explore the models for professional operation of microfinance.

　　【Women's entrepreneurship training program】 To effectively help women to solve practical problems such as employment and entrepreneurship, the "Rainbow Care Action" (temporary name) public welfare project was launched in 2009. Focusing on new changes and new demands of women entrepreneurs, through women vocational skills trainings, women entrepreneurship trainings, women's growth education, etc, it provides employment and entrepreneurship services for the majority of women. Currently, the specialized training institution of "Rainbow Care Action" (temporary name) has been formally established to carry out trainings for women. We are trying to make "Rainbow Care Action" (temporary name) a brand project of women's education.

　　【Women's aid project】 It organized the "Readers Cup - 'Thanks to Mother • Repay the Motherland' Public SMS Service Awarding Activity" jointly with Magazine Readers, covering more than 30 million mobile phone users, which promoted the construction of social habits of "respecting and loving mothers", expanded the publicity and made it convenient for the general public to participate in and support public welfare; It held the anniversary celebration of "Rose Fund". Through the display of the results of helping those women suffering from disfigurement due to domestic violence and accidents, it called for concerns of all circles of society about the survival and development of disfigured women to enhance the social influence of the Foundation. With support from the Propaganda Department of ACWF, the Brand China • Mother Love Fund project carried out cultural poverty alleviation. For instance, it donated China Women's News Daily worth 120,000 Yuan to the women’s federation in impoverished areas. In 2009, the "Project for Mothers to See Light Again" completed 7,500 cataract surgeries; the launching of new projects such as "Mother Green Project Fund" and "Green Angel Action" made a contribution to tree planting and environmental protection; and the dandelion student aid project and the project of safe homes for migrant women also played a positive role in the related poverty reduction field.

　　【Disaster relief projects】 Based on the post-disaster practical needs of women in disaster areas, to support the housing projects of the Ministry of Civil Affairs for the disaster areas, the Foundation invested nearly 20 million Yuan to implement the "housing project for mothers in disaster-hit areas", aiming to build permanent houses for the women, especially single mothers in disaster-hit areas and solve their urgent needs for housing; to address the employment problem of the women in disaster-affected areas, it launched the "Mary Kay Program for Women Entrepreneurship and Employment Trainings in Sichuan", etc; when "Morak" typhoon hit Taiwan, the Foundation rapidly donated 500,000 Yuan through the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait to support Taiwan Taiwan compatriots combat disaster.

　　【Mechanism construction of the Foundation】 1. Management Mechanism.The Foundation formulated a scientific, reasonable, streamlined and efficient position design program that was approved by the Organization Department of All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF); according to the arrangement of ACWF Secretariat, it further improved the leadership team settings and strengthened the functions of its management teams; enhanced the system by continuing to implement the regular session system such as its various office meetings, with communications and reviews as follow-ups in time; and stepped up its employee education by conducting the employee training program and organizing 7 professional training courses on relevant laws, regulations and policies, professional skills and project planning etc., which constantly improved the proficiency of its staff members; it also emphasized team building with a focus on cultures and emphasis on the roles played by the party, the youth league and workers’ union by conducting colorful entertainment and sports activities, and unified the thinking and actions to ensure that all staff members of the foundation share the same vision and thus enjoy boosted team cohesiveness and competence.

2. Working Mechanism.At the beginning of 2009, the foundation changed from a corporation aggregate to a fund legal person, thus further clarified its legal person qualification status; in terms of the management and use of funds, it adhered to standard and transparent management and stepped up its approval and monitoring procedures with strict scrutiny; in project operations, it optimized the work flow, adhered to the public and just rules, and made the fund donors be fully informed or even involved in the project  construction. For instance, in the purchasing process of the Healthy Mother Express project in 2009, the foundation formed a bidding team, adopted a selected bidding method and chose the manufacturer and the vehicles manufactured. As to the distribution of the vehicles, it drew up a strict allocation plan according to the actual situation of each project province, thus ensured the scientific and sustainable implementation of the project; it also improved the review system on various agreements by the legal consultants, and conducted professional management on the review process. It is under the guidance and supervision of departments like Ministry of Civil Affairs, Ministry of Supervision, Ministry of Audit and State Administration of Taxation and has been receiving favorable reviews; it also utilized its own networks and multiple opportunities to publish its fund using status and feedbacks to the donors.

3. Publicity Mechanism. The foundation actively sought to cooperate with enterprises on publicity affairs, enhanced its promotional efforts to general public, and provided a firm basis and support for expanding funding channels and donation sources; it supported the public welfare projects to enhance publicity on focused areas, and gave full coverage publicity report on certain key activities; it compiled yearbooks and published foundation magazines to strengthen its publicity effect and ACWF impact; participated in horizontal exchanges within the industry at home and abroad, took part in the 5.12 Action Forum for Social Organization as an organizer,  participated and spoke in the Women’s Forum 2009 of Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) and participated and spoke in the first Large-scale world foundation Beijing Summit, which promoted the development of the foundation.