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The Centre is determined to control its own destiny by choosing where it wants to work, the people it wants to work with, and the initiatives its members want to work on.

The Centre therefore seeks no external finance for its administrative and organisational costs. The Centre has no paid staff - its activities are all carried out voluntarily or as part of the self-employed business of its members.

The Centre does, however, have a range of technical cooperation partnerships and projects for which it seeks both public donations and grants. The four main appeals are listed above. When you click on the green button you will be taken to a secure site where you can choose the appeal that you want to donate to and the amount of the donation.

Caledonia General Appeal

This appeal is in support of all the work that Caledonia undertakes other than that which is linked to the other specific appeals.

International Solidarity Appeal

This appeal is in support of two third world organisations with which Caledonia has close links. These are Hakikazi Catalyst - a social Justice organisation in Tanzania, and The Womens Bank in Sri Lanka.

Women's Bank - Sri Lanka

The Women's Bank is a cooperative savings and loans society. It grew out of a pre-cooperative network of mutual help groups started in 1989 by 49 poor women drawn from 5 low-income settlements in the country's capital city of Colombo. In 1991 the groups incorporated under Cooperative law as a district financial cooperative and in 1998 they expanded their operations to cover the whole country by re-registering as a national level cooperative society - Women's Bank.

The Bank has around 25,000 low-income members and operates in 16 out of the 24 administrative districts in Sri Lanka. It has 55 Bank Branches in 6 districts that serve about 15,000 members through some 1,400 self-managed groups. In another 10 districts it has mobilized around 10,000 poor women into about 800 groups. These groups are now in the process of being federated into bank branches.

The Bank is engaged in a mission to pool the resources, ideas and support of its members to solve their own problems through applying the cooperative principles of self-help and mutual aid. However as a poor people's organisation financial support in the form of donations is required for a number of their non-financial services:

Contributions to these aspects of the Bank's work are most welcome. To read more about the activities of the Women's Bank click HERE

WISE (Women In Self-Employment)

WISE (Women In Self-Employment) is an Ethiopian organisation, established in 1996 to support very poor women in Addis Ababa. 60% of the population of Addis Ababa lives below the Millennium Development Goal poverty line of US$1/person/day. Unemployment in Addis Ababa is 40%. Both poverty and unemployment affect women worse than men. In addition, many women are single parents and hence have even greater household needs.

WISE was established to tackle these problems of poverty, unemployment and gender inequality.

WISE's vision is: A nation where women are socially and economically empowered, gender equality is attained, and the current level of poverty is significantly reduced.

WISE's mission is: To help poor self-employed urban women in their efforts to achieve self reliance, exercise their rights and improve the quality of their lives by drawing on empowering, development-oriented strategies.

By mid-2008, WISE had organised 12,000 women into 35 SACCOs (Savings and Credit Cooperatives), in which members save and from which they take loans for their businesses. The women run microenterprises, mainly in retail, catering and food processing.

WISE provides the women with training, in basic business skills, creative thinking, leadership, basic health, gender, HIV, and, for those who need it, literacy and numeracy. WISE operates from its own building in Addis Ababa, with training and meeting rooms and a basic health unit, staffed by two nurses.

WISE found that even when women increased their income, they could still not afford healthcare, and so WISE facilitates a simple health insurance association, which helps members of the association pay for their healthcare costs.

Of the 35 SACCOs formed so far, 12 are now self-sustaining, paying all their own running costs, including one member of staff each and accounting services from the Union of WISE SACCOs. This Union of WISE SACCOs provides banking services on the WISE premises. WISE recruits women who are below the Ethiopian poverty line of US$0.33/person/day, and through the above services, helps them to increase their income by about 25% a year.

WISE has many plans for the future. With extra funds, WISE can, for example:

The Caledonia Centre for Social Development has close contact with WISE and is assured of its financial probity. Further information on WISE can be found in this document.

Please proceed to our donations page at the justgiving.com website and select WISE from the drop down menu.