On April 3rd, Barbara Hintermann, Executive Director of Terre des Hommes, reminded us of the NGO's mission, talked about the challenges and opportunities faced by Terre des Hommes and the whole sector and stated in no uncertain terms "we will not give up and we will stand for our values and for the rights of all children around the globe".

Video by Warebo Production

↳ The European states budget cuts had been announced and the NGOs were preparing for the impact. The US cuts were not gradual, they were abrupt and gave no time to plan operations accordingly. On the global level, we are talking about hundreds of millions of people who will not have either humanitarian aid or will benefit from development projects

↳ 8 countries have been directly impacted by the US cuts for Terre des Hommes, among which Kenya, Bangladesh, India, Lebanon, Burkina Faso, Afghanistan. We are talking about impact on 1.5 million beneficiaries. 440 staff members in those countries have been laid off already, because as an NGO they do not have big reserves

↳ Barbara is very concerned about LOCAL PARTNERS in Afghanistan, Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Western Africa, across Asia, who will be unable to provide the services they have been providing for many years. The consequences will be dire: social tensions, new conflicts, health issues outbreaks, increased migration

↳ Difficult choices to be made. How will Terre des Hommes allocate the lower budget? They will prioritise support to the most vulnerable, among the vulnerable

↳ Opportunities: the whole system must be re-designed. Example - Compliance and Reporting: right now, roughly every million of their budget comes with its own audit every year; Terre des hommes is currently being audited 90 times per year, by separate donors, even if a project is co-funded. Imagine a project is co-funded by 3 different Governments: 3 separate sets of reporting and audits are required. This means human resources: people have to be hired to handle reporting and auditing full time

↳ Opportunities: French NGOs created a Hub called Hulo (more info HERE), which centralises operations such as admin, purchasing and logistics for several NGOs, helping them become more efficient and lowering their budgets. Terre des hommes' Barbara Hintermann has begun talks with other Swiss based NGO's, aiming to the creation of a similar Hub in Switzerland, which might even be eligible for Swiss Government funding

For updates about Terre des Hommes activities, click HERE