Connecting people in a worldof need

Crossroads at Davos 2015

Sometimes it’s easy to wish that some of the world’s most powerful people could visit some of the world’s least powerful. It’s usually hard to bring such people to a slum area, but, through simulation, we can bring a brief ‘x-perience’ of poverty to them. That’s why we took the ‘Struggle for Survival’ to the World Economic Forum in Davos again in 2015.

Some of our Global X-perience team joined other helpers from around the world to run the x-perience for the participants and it was, as always, an amazing, fruitful time with many corporate and political leaders taking part.

“It is more than a simulation. It’s a life changing experience,” said Ryan Erenhouse from MasterCard. “Even though I have many times visited … the poorest communities… this exercise does something more… It makes you really feel it,” Gene Sperling, former National Economic Advisor to President Clinton and President Obama.

Each participant was challenged to make commitments as to how they would use their own resources and influence now to make a difference in the lives of the poor.

CNN covered the Struggle for Survival. You can see their clip below:

You can also see pictures of people taking part here:

To view these in our Flickr Gallery click here.

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Disaster Relief: Vanuatu

Update: This shipment has been loaded and is currently on its way.

Cyclone Pam is reported to be one of the worst cyclones ever to hit the southern hemisphere. On 13 March, Category 5 Cyclone Pam devastated the archipelago of Vanuatu, essentially flattening villages on the worst-hit islands and damaging most buildings in the capital, Port Vila.

A state of emergency has been declared in Vanuatu, with half of the population affected. Tens of thousands of people have been cut off from services such as water and electricity, and many are now simply surviving on fruit they can find on the ground. Locals will soon be, if not already, in desperate need of clean water, food, personal items such as soap, and cooking supplies. Some have had not just their homes, but their entire village washed away or destroyed in the savage storm. They are in need of temporary emergency shelter and essential supplies.

Crossroads has partners already working in Vanuatu who are appealing for immediate emergency relief supplies. Thanks to our disaster preparedness programme, Crossroads has kitchen and hygiene kits pre-prepared and ready to send. We will be shipping a 20’ container of these relief goods to provide assistance to families in need.

Our partner organisation has been conducting ongoing work in Vanuatu to provide educational opportunities for particularly disadvantaged children on Efate and Tanna Islands.

They usually work with 600 children attending 6 different schools. A primary focus of their work is capacity-building through teacher training of over 50 local staff workers. This project’s aim is to see the workers become independent teachers and managers – local teachers teaching local students. They also provide education regarding health, hygiene, computing and literacy, which benefits the entire community.

Both Efate and Tanna Islands were severely affected by Cyclone Pam and our partners now have the difficult job of providing relief and assistance to affected families that they work with. Crossroads’ shipment will equip them to help.

Give Now!

Donate to this shipment now! In the ‘what for’ box, write ‘Vanuatu S4333.’

Donate Goods!

Want to donate goods for a shipment like this one?

Vanuatu Snapshot

Population: 266,937
Capital: Port Vila

The archipelago of Vanuatu is made up of 82 Islands stretching across 1,300km. It is situated north-east of Australia and to the west of Fiji; with the Solomon Islands to the north and New Caledonia to the south.

In Vanuatu, 60% of the labour force works in agriculture.

The GDP per capita is US$3,039 or around $8 per day. In Hong Kong, the GDP per capita is US$33,534 or $91 per day.

Cyclone Pam has affected 166 000 people – over 60% of the total population.

Global Hand helps UN fight Ebola crisis

The statistics on the West African Ebola outbreak have been terrifying: more than 10,000 people dead and thousands more currently infected. The epidemic is, thankfully, slowing, but we know that without efficient and coordinated action, many more lives could have been lost. As the world rallied to respond, the United Nations asked our Global Hand team to help them organise an online response page where the business community can give money, services and ideas to help. You can see it at https://business.un.org/en/disasters/7418

Global Hand has worked with the United Nations since building their web portal www.business.un.org for companies to interact on UN projects.

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Israel: Furniture and Household Goods mean Hope

Furniture and Household Goods Mean Hope

Arriving to make a new life in a country with just a couple of suitcases is a challenge for anyone, let alone if you barely speak the language and have no means of income. It is expected that around 25,000 migrants will have arrived to live in Israel in 2014, a significant increase compared with 2013.

The government helps newcomers by providing apartments, but the migrants lack the funds to buy basic furniture and household equipment, needing to use all their money just to survive.

A project in Israel receives containers from all around the world and distributes furniture and household goods to people like these migrants, as well as other organisations who work for the benefit of the underprivileged in the country. Crossroads is excited to ship another container to support the work.

Potential impact:

Clothing, shoes and babywear for hundreds of adults & children
Household items, bedding, cleaning equipment for hundreds
Office furniture to help a number of projects to work more efficiently.

Shipment includes:

Clothing, shoes, babywear, coat hangers, accessories
Household furniture, cleaning equipment, ironing boards
Toys, puzzles and games.

These young people live a in a youth village founded in 1952 to serve underprivileged youth. The idea was to allow youth at risk to enjoy greater opportunities in life through educational assistance, enrichment activities, vocational training and emotional support. “We will not give up on any young person entering our village” is the motto of the project.
The 60-year old building with old furnishings was in dire need of a face-lift, and the project distributed beds, chairs and tables, along with furnishings to make the facilities more homely and comfortable. The supplies came both from Holland and from our most recent shipment from Hong Kong.

This shipment will include clothing for the poor in the community, and furniture and equipment to suit organisations like this one.

Give Now!

Donate to a shipment like this one.

Donate Goods!

Want to donate goods for a shipment like this one?

Israel Snapshot

Capital: Jerusalem

Population: 8.2million. 75% of the population is ethnically Jewish, 21% Arab

Israel/Palestine is tucked into the Middle East at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. Geographic features range from the coastal plain with a Mediterranean climate, to the hot Negev Desert in the south, to mountain ranges where it snows in winter.

With the country’s political instability, it is often the poor and immigrant communities who suffer most.

China: Disaster preparedness

Disaster preparedness

When a flood or earthquake strikes, getting emergency aid to victims in time can be the difference between life and death.

Crossroads has been working with a partner in China since 2002 to ‘pre-position’ relief supplies of blankets, clothing and other goods needed after a disaster. When we can regularly ship these emergency items into China, it means they can be stored in strategic areas, ready to go immediately after a disaster hits.

In November 2013, for example, a series of earthquakes hit Qianguo county, severely damaging housing and leaving thousands of people homeless in temperatures of -15 degrees Celsius. Crossroads’ partner was able to launch a campaign within two days of the disaster, and on the third day, deliver Crossroads’ pre-positioned blankets and clothes worth more than 1 million yuan to help 3,670 people.

This shipment will be similarly strategic, restocking supplies for their relief warehouse so that our partners can act quickly when people need urgent help.

China_S1359U_3

After a severe earthquake in October 2014, hundreds of homes in Qianguo county were damaged and too dangerous to live in. While residents waited for help rebuilding their homes , they quickly constructed tents of plastic, or huts made of firewood (above), but temperatures fell as low as -15 degrees Celsius and they had no heating. Crossroads’ partner delivered warm clothes and blankets to help the waiting families (left) and worked with them to relieve other basic needs.This shipment will include blankets, clothing and other relief goods to help victims of disasters in China like floods and earthquakes.

Give Now!

Donate to this shipment now! In the ‘what for’ box, write ‘China S1359U’.

Donate Goods!

Want to donate goods for a shipment like this one?

China Snapshot

Population: 1.35 billion

Capital: Beijing

Population below international poverty line of US$1.25 per day: 11%, or 157 million people

China is experiencing rapid economic growth, but the benefits have not reached millions of people in rural areas. People who are already poor are the most vulnerable to death, injury and loss of livelihood when floods and earthquakes hit.

Natural disasters in China affect more than 200 million people every year.

Hope after incarceration: Zambia

“I was doing Grade 7 when my father was sentenced to life imprisonment,” recounts Bodiao. “Life came to a standstill as...

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WHO IS THIS SHIPMENT HELPING? Liberia as a nation is still suffering deep social and economic wounds from a civil war that ended...

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Shipment Feedback: The conflict in Syria continues to devastate lives and communities, with thousands of people still displaced and living in flimsy...

Cameroon: Educating and rebuilding

WHO IS THIS SHIPMENT HELPING? When we first started working with our Cameroonian partners in 2010, they were planning and working on...

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