World Vision, a scam?
I think we all know World Vision, it’s one of big charity organisations around the world. They promote sponsoring child in third world countries, supporting in health and education. In Australia alone, I very often see World Vision stalls in many Malls and their ads on the TV. Many of my friends are also participating in sponsoring a child through World Vision. But what I just saw today on ABC Foreign Correspondent just shocked me, speechless, if it was true.
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Reporter: Andrew Geoghega, shown on ABC TV Australia in Foreign Correspondent on Saturday, 29 Nov 2008, 01.00pm EST. Program: Ethiopia – The Endless Famine
In order to put a human face on this tragedy Africa Correspondent Andrew Geoghegan travels to Ethiopia to meet 14-year-old Tsayhnesh Degalo. He’s sponsored her for most of the past decade through World Vision. He’s surprised to discover virtually none of the money he donates goes to the family. The child even did not know until now that she has a sponsor, what all she got from World Vision were just a jacket and a pen. Her family is very poor, they are eating the root of false banana.
When Andrew Geoghega challenged the Word Vision, they said the donation goes to community project such as education. Andrew was told by World Vision the child is learning English at school and has been improving, but when he discovered, the child doesn’t speak English at all.
You can watch the video of the report here: Windows broadband, dial-up.
If you are using Apple, you can access the video through this link: http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/broadband.htm
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February 20th, 2010 at 10:57 am
Many years ago I used to work very closely with several aid organizations in East Africa. Many of these organizations truly lived up to their reported aim, and their employees and volunteers made sure that as much as possible of sponsors donations was actually spent on aid projects.
This could not be said of World Vision who spent most of their money on an office suite in the most expensive property in Nairobi, exorbitantly high salaries for its staff, and the latest and most expensive cars. I can attest this to be true because I saw it with my own eyes.
I could recount MANY more stories, but since they are not first hand, that would not be fair. Having said that however, I will mention one anecdote because I saw the end result, and the person who told me the first half was well known to me and had no reason to exaggerate.
He was involved in several aid projects in Northern Kenya, near the Ethiopian border. One day several World Vision 4WD vehicles arrived. They were very interested about the work he was doing and asked lots and lots of questions. He was flattered by all this interest (most relief work goes unrecognized) and he enthusiastically gave them all the information they wanted. They ended up giving him a donation of $1000.00 Now a thousand bucks was a lot of money 25 years ago and he was overwhelmed. They asked if they could make a film of what he was doing, and of course he agreed.
Lots of film gear was unloaded, and they spent several hours filming in the area. He noticed however that they only spent a few minutes filming him, and this puzzled him.
Flash forward more than a year – I am now in the States, and one evening on the TV is an appeal from World Vision for donations to help support all the projects they were “funding” in various countries. To my surprise, one of the projects they featured was this territory in North Kenya which I knew so well. Now, they certainly did not actually say that it was an actual “World Vision” project, planned and executed by them, but that was the impression that the short film gave. It looked as if World Vision was changing the life of thousands! They never showed my friend at all.
So in essence what they did is was pay $1000 so they could film an existing project, and then use this film to raise funds.
I am sure in their minds they see nothing wrong with this, but if they were not afraid to give the whole truth, why not acknowledge it.
So, when you give funds to World Vision, who benefits most – the project they are showing, or World Vision?
When giving money to any aid organization ask what percentage actually goes into “aid.” The answer is invariably very high – around 90%. But if you now ask if that figure includes salaries, vehicles, fancy housing and high office rents in the country where the “aid” is being dispensed, you might find them not so forthcoming.
June 20th, 2010 at 2:54 am
What kinds of topics do you write about.
July 23rd, 2010 at 12:00 pm
Hello there
I am keen to make contact with Jack. He may be able to assist me with some research I’m doing.
Cheers
Mary Ann
August 22nd, 2010 at 3:59 pm
Some 20 years ago, a consumer watchdog on Swiss TV showed a similar piece where they went and checked on children sponsored by people through World Vision. The outcome was the same as in Andrew’s case. The children did not even know their Sponsors and were no regular recipients of money. It was all but a marketing stunt backed by lies. My employer, which at the time provided cash management services to World Vision free of charge – showed them the door over this incident.
I suppose there will always be good charities and bad charities and it will be almost impossible to distinguish the good from the bad based on some leaflet or TV commercial.
It does however seem that the bigger they are the more wasteful and corrupt they become – perhaps because in big charities it is even more difficult to audit how much of the donations go to the intended cause. Charities also seem to attract a lot of fraudsters and hedonists in search for an easy and lavish lifestyle in an exotic country.
For sure, the fact that World Vision has not corrected its modus operandi even after that very public and disastrous disclosure 20 years ago is telling a lot about the organization.
August 24th, 2010 at 6:36 am
I have been sponsoring a girl in the Jeju Area Developmentproject in Ethopia for 10 Years.
I just received the lastest “update” from World Vision on the child I sponsor. Her favorite subject is English and her hobby is drawing. She is in Grade 6 going to 7.
1) If she is learning English how come she never writes, its always “translated and written” by a worker.
2) Her drawing is a square box. I would think a grade 6 girl would have a better imagination.
I think she does exist, but that World Vision has people in offices just filling out these from and sending them out to sponsors. $33 per month is not much to help a child in developing countries, but I hate to be scammed. Could the money be put to better use??