The international children’s rights organization, SOS Children’s Villages, received 125,000 sek from NCC's 2014 Christmas donation. The money will support the construction of a new family home where orphans and abandoned children will be able to receive a secure and loving upbringing.

Secure homes

“Our activities aim to create secure homes for children who’ve lost, or who can no longer live with, their parents. We never separate siblings and a permanent mother lives with the children during their entire upbringing,” says anna magnard, the person responsible for company partnerships with SOS Children’s Villages in Sweden.

Bolivia is one of South America’s poorest countries. Nearly half of all the children there live in poverty. Many children below the age of five suffer from chronic malnutrition and thousands of children live on the streets.

Since the 1960s

SOS Children’s Villages has existed in Bolivia since the 1960s and has built ten children’s villages with family homes and preschools. The family homes have a permanent mother and between five to ten children live together as a family.

“The children that come to the children’s villages are traumatized and need support to be able to go on. It takes a while for the mother to win their trust and for the children to begin feeling secure,” Anna Magnard says.

The preschools are also open to local children who have biological parents. This makes it possible for the parents to go out and work, which reduces the risk of more children being abandoned.

Also elementary schools

SOS Children’s Villages has also started elementary schools and vocational schools that are open to all children in the local area. In recent years, a number of family-strengthening programs have been initiated. These support vulnerable families and children so that they can stay together and improve their standard of living.

SOS Children’s Villages was founded in 1949 in Austria by Hermann Gmeiner, who wanted to create something better than traditional orphanages for all of the children who lost their parents during the second world war. Today the organization exists in 134 countries under national propriety names.

NCC's 2014 Christmas donation was handed out to three organizations. Doctors Without Borders received the largest share of 750,000 SEK. The Save the Children fund and SOS Children's Villages received 125,000 SEK each.