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July 02, 2007

Children's Fund in Britain Passes $1-Billion

Chris Hohn, a British hedge fund manager, donated $460-million to the Children’s Investment Fund last year, pushing the fund past $1.4-billion just five years after opening, reports The Financial Times.

Mr. Hohn wife’s, Jamie Cooper-Hohn, runs a foundation that focuses on helping children with HIV in developing countries. A portion of the earnings from Children’s Investment Fund Management goes to that foundation each year.

Monday July 2, 2007 | Permalink

Comments

1. As one who for years has struggled to keep a school going in one of Africa’s slums, who knows that one cannot separate the environment of a child from that of their home and therefore attempts to assist their families, and who has thus lived with the problems of disease and poverty, forgive me if I am becoming very confused by the current continuous information about worthy and compassionate people who are donating large sums of money towards eradicating these two unfortunate situations.
   Obviously it is an extremely deep hole to fill, but where exactly, and how exactly, are these huge amounts of money ending up? The UN Agencies apparently have the same goals, as do a large number of international organisations, but I for one have not seen even a minimal dent being achieved. I have, though, seen how aid money gets dispersed along the way into gigantic salaries, travelling, workshops, unread documents, etc., at the upper levels of administration, dispersed by employees who are supposedly working on the ground in direct contact with the supposed recipients, and even diverted into profitable retail outlets. If these good people are handing good money over and not troubling themselves to remain closely involved with concrete facts and figures and with personal visits, then the only probable benefit of it all is in the tax returns.

   — Eugene Yakub    Jul 5, 04:02 PM    #

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