Latest news from the Board of Directors

Fontana Foundation visits WAWCAS
In March, Walter Zahnd, a consultant and representative of the Swiss foundation, Fontana Foundation, paid a visit to WAWCAS. The Fontana Foundation was established in November 2008 by Mario Fontana. Like WAWCAS, its purpose is to help poor people through education or by providing financing to start a small business. The sponsorship to WAWCAS enables the foundation to target their support to specific projects, thus creating better opportunities for poor women and children in Nepal. “We were very impressed to see what the women have achieved with support from the WAWCAS team”, Walter Zahnd said after a visit to the Lamjung area where he visited different women and the cooperative goat and pig farms. Board member Soren Schriver explains that precisely these visits are extremely important as they provide a good starting point for strengthening the co-operation between sponsors and WAWCAS: “We are very pleased with this kind of visit. It is extremely important for us that our sponsors can see what the money goes to and what the support quite specifically enables us to do. In 2015 alone, more than 450 new small businesses supported by WAWCAS will shot up. The number of women starting their own business has grown and we will experience the same kind of growth in the years to come. The money does make a difference.”

Nina in Nepal
International Program Director Nina Schriver spent a busy month in Nepal where the mainfocus was to get the work with the new WAWCAS data model properly launched.

“It has been a fantastic and intense process during which Christine Thorsen and Jorgen Fogh Hansen together with the WAWCAS team in Nepal have worked with a programmer, a project team leader, and the owner of MiDas to establish what the data model should consist of and what it should be able to do” says Nina Schriver.
Another important item was the visit at the start of March by consultant of the Fontana Foundation Walther Zahnd and his wife Elizabeth. They paid a visit to the WAWCAS project in Lamjung during which there was ample opportunity to discuss the program and explain why almost all the women have succeeded in establishing a good business”, Nina says and elaborates:
“It was very stimulating with the good questions that Walther and Elizabeth asked. It is lovely being able to show what exactly the money which the Fontana Foundation donates goes to and what massive change they contribute with in the local community as well as for the individual woman. We highly appreciate this kind of involvement by our sponsors.”

Work on the WAWCAS annual report has started
As in previous years, the starting point will be the finances which are linked to WAWCAS International in Denmark. This is a requirement for us as a self-governing institution. But as most of our activities take place outside of Denmark and since an increasing part of donations go directly to Nepal, the board has decided that WAWCAS will attempt to write a report which covers the whole organization. We look forward to presenting this part in our next newsletter.

Results are collected in a database
WAWCAS has received donations directed specifically to the further development of the WAWCAS data model. The data model will contain information that the local program managers collect about each of the WAWCAS women, their families and the women’s groups.

After a thorough analysis, the Nepali Company MiDas has been chosen to develop the data model solution.
In March, the International Program Director Nina Schriver, the staff in Nepal, and two Danish volunteers (Christine and George) started the project and now the development of the data model has been launched.

When the model is complete, WAWCAS can electronically report and keep track of the considerable information on women already in the program, and new members.

It will also make it easier to analyze data and see patterns across the women and groups. The idea is that the system will be put into use this year and must be operable by the staff through a tablet.

Private fundraising
WAWCAS has received regulatory approval to collect from private sponsors. In the coming months the board and the volunteers from the communication group are planning how the collection will be launched and distributed. The goal is to create considerable attention surrounding the fundraising, such that the economic results are favorable. WAWCAS has previously carried out a fundraising from private sponsors.

Webpage in Danish and English
It has been vital for WAWCAS to address the need of an English website, wawcasinternational.com, given a rapid growth in international sponsors, partners and contracts. Both the English and Danish sites will be updated with news from WAWCAS regularly.

WAWCAS in numbers

  • 21 different business types
  • 1200 women in total, 450 of which are still in training
  • From April 2015-2016, 450 new women will join

WAWCAS Children at school:

  • 100% in Kathmandu, where approximately 70% go to private school after the women’s first year involved in the program
  • In Lamjung private school is not possible, but a significant number of women pay for private education for their children. After a year 100 % of the children regularly to school.