International Fundraising

When he set up a nonprofit organization 35 years ago to sell organic vegetables, Kazuyoshi Fujita never expected his pursuit would grow into a big business.

Advocating environmentally friendly foods, his NPO, Daichi wo Mamoru Kai (the Association to Preserve the Earth), is now a company with annual sales of ¥16 billion and 200 employees.

To support basic research that will build a foundation for generating sustainable, science-based solutions to agricultural problems in developing countries, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded 15 grants in the inaugural year of the Basic Research to Enable Agricultural Development (BREAD) program.

The five-year program is jointly funded with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. 

Through the partnership between the Gates Foundation and the BREAD program, NSF is supporting international projects, with funding provided to both U.S. institutions and their international collaborators.

More than 30 nonprofit organizations wrote to President Obama today urging him to ease anti-terrorism restrictions that the groups say hinder legitimate charitable giving and aid work abroad.

The organizations -- which include American Jewish World Service, the Charity and Security Network, and the Muslim Public Affairs Council -- reminded Mr. Obama of a statement he made last June in Cairo in which he said that some charitable rules have made giving difficult for American Muslims and that he would work with them to help fulfill their religious obligation to donate.

BEIJING — The Chinese government in the past several weeks has intensified a subtle but steady tightening over the country's freewheeling civil society sector, with some nonprofit groups saying they are feeling increasingly harassed, targeted by tax investigations and subjected to new restrictions on receiving donations from abroad.

What if we could extend this knowledge sharing beyond our own borders? What if we could learn how fundraisers in Bolivia deal with the lack of postal or banking systems? How did a Dutch organization generate more than 500,000 monthly donors? How are Italian organizations using digital media to drive results? How could we, wherever we are located, learn from our fundraising cousins on the other side of the planet?

Fundraisers across the globe are facing challenges. No matter where your organization is headquartered or where its work takes hold, the issues generally are the same: acquiring, retaining and engaging donors in an ever-changing societal landscape.

Spasiba. That's Russian for "thank you." It's the one word I got really good at saying while walking around Moscow. I'm big on appreciation, and live my life in a grateful way, so it seemed fitting that I would be thanking people halfway across the world when I visited them.

November 3, 2009, Third Sector — Charities are likely to lose millions in income if the postal strikes continue into the Christmas period, according to a report by the Institute of Fundraising.

October 23, 2009, The Chronicle of Philanthropy — The recession has had a widely varying effect on charities in Europe, said speakers at this week’s International Fundraising Congress in Noordwijkerhout, the Netherlands.

October 9, 2009 - A number of key organisations are concerned that if the strikes continue between now and Christmas, seen as a key time for fund-raising, then appeals and donations will be severely hampered. They argue that the situation is exacerbated by the current economic downturn.