USAID Timor-Leste
Democracy and Governance
Program Highlights Archive
Course Helps NGOs Get Funds Closer to Home
(September 9, 2003)

A special training course for nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) aims to help them raise local funding for themselves. Catholic Relief Services (CRS) held two of the training courses recently, one in Dili and one in the district capital of Baucau. Representatives from 18 NGOs around the country attended the sessions.

The CRS course helps NGOs develop opportunities to raise funds and support from local businesses, civic organizations, individuals, and the government. By increasing the proportion of local resources in their budgets, NGOs will become less dependent on international donors. Such a strategy also strengthens their ties to the community.

Participants learned about two basic resource-gathering techniques: soliciting monetary or in-kind donations and generating income through NGO-run enterprises. Among the potential monetary or in-kind donors in East Timor, CRS expects that solicitations from individual members of the community and local businesses will be the most successful. Various levels of government are more likely to be able to offer in-kind support, such as use of buildings or property.

Small-scale enterprises also may offer NGOs a steady, sustainable income. Among the examples offered by CRS are:

· AVR, a veteran's organization that prints handbooks, pamphlets, and other small publications on its printing press and has rented out simultaneous translation equipment
· Perkumpulan Hak, a civil and human rights association that rents out its vehicles and space in its offices for training courses, and contracts its specialist staff to international organizations, including UNICEF and UNOPS
· Fokupers, the Women's Communication Forum that provides training space and also has a retail sales operation for handicrafts.

The funding course is part of CRS's two-year Engaging Civil Society Project. Funded in part by USAID, the project targets four national NGOs and their district-level partners to strengthen their relationships with their communities, improve their organizational skills, and increase their effectiveness as they interact with the government.