HOPESPEAKS

ADVOCACY IN ACTION

World Vision advocates for all children, particularly those who are poor, neglected, abused or marginalized. We work to create the social and economic conditions that will allow them to enjoy life to the full. We also empower children with knowledge of their rights and how to exercise them.

Senegal: Keeping children off the streets
Ousmane, 6, hits the streets of Dakar, Senegal, each day before dawn. Dressed
in a filthy T-shirt and ragged shorts, he carries a large, empty tin as a begging
bowl. It marks him as a talibé, a word that means "disciple" or "student."

Talibés are boys whose parents have sent them to study the Koran with a special teacher. While many of these teachers are legitimate educators, others are child traffickers who force their young charges to beg for cash or food.

Senegal has up to 100,000 child beggars like Ousmane — a huge number in a country of only 11 million people. Across the developing world, 150 million children eke out an existence on the streets, where they are prime targets for sexual and economic exploitation.

World Vision works to prevent these children from falling prey to abuse, hunger and disease. We educate parents in rural communities about the perils of sending their children to the city and help to improve local living conditions through development programs funded by child sponsorship donations. The 10,200 Senegalese children whom Canadians sponsor are much less likely to end up on the street as a result of the access to education, potable water, sufficient food and income-generating opportunities that child sponsorship helps provide.

World Vision also advocates for children's rights at the local, national and international levels. Through workshops, self-help groups and advocacy campaigns, we teach the talibés and other marginalized children about their rights. Our aim is to help every child reach their God-given potential.

" Hope has two daughters. Their names are anger and courage: anger at the way things are; and courage to make them the way they ought to be."
St. Augustine

Canada: Better Aid Bill passed
Canada is improving the effectiveness and accountability of its foreign aid. With the passage of the "Better Aid Bill" — legislation that World Vision has long and vigorously championed — Canada now has an explicit goal for all foreign-aid spending: reducing poverty around the world.

It took three years of intense lobbying for the bill to make its way through Parliament. World Vision joined other organizations to move the process forward. Thousands of our supporters visited MPs, phoned senators, sent e-mails and letters, and signed petitions.
The bill's sponsor, John McKay, later acknowledged the important role these efforts played in a speech before the House of Commons. In the end, the groundswell of public support convinced parliamentarians to unanimously approve the bill with only minor amendments.

Canadian foreign aid must now prioritize the world's poorest countries, along with programs that reduce poverty. Furthermore, decisions on aid contributions have to consider the perspectives of the poor and be consistent with international human-rights standards, including the rights of the child. The government is also required to consult with organizations such as World Vision and to publicly account for how it spends aid dollars.

Afghanistan: Focusing on children
Afghanistan is the Government of Canada's top foreign policy priority. World Vision has been working there since 2002 and our community development projects in the war-torn land now benefit more than half a million people.

World Vision has helped to increase access to education for Afghan girls by 98 per cent in the communities where it operates. We have built or rehabilitated 41 schools, giving thousands of female students the chance to receive an education for the first time. In addition, we are providing in-home literacy training to more than 100,000 women and girls.

To help reduce the country's high rate of child mortality, World Vision introduced child immunization and midwifery training programs throughout rural Afghanistan. We also opened a special unit for premature, underweight and sick newborns and infants. Funded by private donors, this unit has provided critical medical care to 7,000 babies.

Drawing on our experience in Afghanistan, World Vision is urging the Canadian government to focus more attention on child protection, to boost funding for relief and development and to step up diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict. As part of this dialogue, World Vision representatives addressed the Independent Panel on Canada's Future Role in Afghanistan chaired by John Manley, whose recommendations are helping to shape Canada's policy on Afghanistan.

Middle East: Waging peace
Robi Damelin is Israeli. Ali Abu Awwad is Palestinian. A Palestinian sniper killed Damelin's son; an Israeli soldier shot Abu Awwad's brother.

The chasm between the grieving Jewish mother and the distraught Palestinian brother might appear unbridgeable. But Damelin and Abu Awwad have come to realize that what they share in common — the pain of losing a loved one and the profound desire for peace — is far greater than what separates them.

Both now belong to the Parents Circle-Families Forum, a group of Jews, Muslims and Christians who have all lost family members in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. They hold meetings in high schools, universities and community centres throughout Israel and the Palestinian territories, testifying to the possibility of forgiveness and promoting a vision of peace.

"For the first time, Palestinians and Israelis are meeting to share their pain. We're meeting about the issues that politicians use to justify killing," says Abu Awwad. "We try to explain the reasons for the hatred and misunderstanding and convey that the people on the other side aren't animals; they are human. There is an alternative language to violence."

World Vision has supported such peace-building initiatives in the Middle East for the past three decades. In May, we invited Damelin and Abu Awwad to share their stories and discuss ongoing peace efforts with Canadians in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and Winnipeg. MPs and senior government officials were among the audience in Ottawa as Damelin and Abu Awwad called for a solution to the Middle East crisis that balances the rights and needs of all people in the region.

In the West Bank and Gaza, World Vision continues to work with struggling communities to overcome poverty — offering hope as an alternative to anger and despair for children growing up in the midst of conflict.