When we look around at the world, what do we see?Violence and conflict. The looming calamity of climate change. Poverty so harsh that women turn to work on the streets to feed their children. Ignorance so extreme that husbands pass on HIV to the ones they love.
But after 60 years of striving to end such poverty and injustice, giving up is not an option for us.
Inspired by our values of hope, justice, courage and honesty, we are committed to seeing a just world. Now. Not just in the future. We believe in life before death.
We have three essential aims:
• To deliver real, practical benefits on the ground
We work where the need is greatest in nearly 50 countries, regardless of ethnicity, nationality or religion, to meet suffering and stop poverty – whether through providing emergency relief or long-term development.
After 60 years of striving to end poverty and injustice, giving up is not an option
We support 716 local organisations who know best how to deliver what people really need. From providing shelters for battered women in Iraq, to helping people earn a better living from farming their land in Bangladesh, to getting emergency relief to Afghan villages so families don’t have to sell their daughters in marriage to help their families survive drought.
• To speak out where there is injustice
Ending poverty isn’t about applying sticking plasters. Where we have to – and we often do – we speak out to challenge its causes.
When our partners take a stand, we back them. We stand alongside our partners in Zimbabwe, where they’re risking all to bring about change; in Darfur, where confronting the Sudanese government can land you in jail; and in Colombia, where campaigning for human rights can get you a death threat.
• To campaign for change
With nearly 100,000 campaigners, and hundreds of thousands of supporters based in churches and communities across the UK and Ireland, we are, first and foremost, a movement of people who want change.
They don’t hold back. They tell governments, companies and institutions what they need to do to address poverty – whether that’s companies that need to cut their carbon emissions to stop climate change or governments that need to give more aid to fight HIV.
They and others have made victories possible: against apartheid, to reduce third world debt, to put trade on the global agenda.
We are independent of government. As signatories to the Red Cross and Red Crescent Code of Conduct, we are impartial and neutral in our distribution of aid. We are governed by our 41 sponsoring churches, which elect our board of trustees.
As a charitable company limited by guarantee, we are registered with the UK Companies House, the Charity Commission for England and Wales and the Office of the Scottish Charity Register. Christian Aid now operates in Ireland through two new companies limited by guarantee, one in Northern Ireland and one in the Republic of Ireland, each registered as Christian Aid Ireland.