Rabies elimination project shortlisted for national award
Among The Charity Awards shortlist announced on Tuesday 7 May is a project that demonstrated that rabies can be successfully eliminated in resource poor areas. The Charity Awards are one of the sector’s most prestigious schemes, and the 2013 winners will be announced on 13 June.
The Global Alliance for Rabies Control’s (GARC) pilot project was one of only two entries shortlisted from hundreds of entries in the Healthcare and medical research category. The project took place on the island of Bohol in the Philippines, a country with one of the highest rates of rabies in the world. The project focussed on the group at highest risk of dying from the disease – the under 15s – and sought to eliminate rabies in four years, creating a model that could go on to be utilised elsewhere.
The project focused on empowering and educating the community, giving them the skills to manage the risk of rabies themselves, as well as improving diagnosis and the availability of vaccines. Thanks to the project, rabies in Bohol was eliminated ahead of schedule – the project was launched in 2007 and by 2009 the number of deaths from the disease was zero. By providing for continuing education of 180,000 primary school children in the province every year and equipping over 15,000 people with training as part of the project, GARC is confident that the community will be able to continue to prevent, monitor and react to human exposures and suspect cases into the future.
GARC is now testing the Bohol model in a variety of settings in other areas of the Philippines, Chad, Indonesia and Tanzania.
And the winner is…
GARC is hoping to pick up the coveted award for its pilot project at a glittering ceremony in London on 13 June. If it wins its category it will also be in the running to pick up the Overall Award for Excellence, which is selected from the 10 category winners.
The Charity Awards is the highest profile event in the charity calendar. All 30 shortlisted charities this year have been judged by an independent panel of sector leaders as having demonstrated outstanding best practice from which other organisations can learn.
Daniel Phelan, organiser of The Charity Awards comments:
“In being shortlisted, GARC has demonstrated exceptional performance against as many of the ten hallmarks of excellence as possible. I wish them the best of luck on the night.”
John Low, chief executive of Charities Aid Foundation, overall sponsors of the Charity Awards, comments:
“I would like to congratulate and commend all the shortlisted charities this year, as well as everyone who took the time to submit an application. Once again the calibre of entries was very impressive – at a time when the sector, indeed the country, is under such financial pressure, The Charity Awards gives us all the opportunity to step back, reflect and be inspired.”
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Notes to editors:
• The Charity Awards 2013, now in its fourteenth year, is organised by Civil Society Media, publishers of Charity Finance, Fundraising and Governance magazines and www.civilsociety.co.uk.
• The Charity Awards is sponsored by the Charities Aid Foundation (www.cafonline.org). The Charities Aid Foundation is a charity set up to help other charities by working with donors, companies and charities to encourage and facilitate a culture of giving. They do this by offering products and services that make giving easier, tax efficient and help charities to make the most of donations through their banking and fundraising support services.
• The Charity Awards is also supported by The Times and The Sunday Times.
The distinguished panel of judges for 2013 are:
• Andrew Hind CB, editor of Charity Finance and former chief executive of the Charity Commission
• Dr John Low CBE, chief executive of the Charities Aid Foundation
• Danielle Walker Palmour, director of the Friends Provident Foundation
• Sir Christopher Kelly KCB, chair of the King’s Fund
• Lesley-Anne Alexander CBE, chief executive of RNIB
• Sue Sayer CBE, chief executive of United Response
• Fiona Ellis, member of NCVO Funding Commission and former director of the Northern Rock Foundation
• Anne-Marie Piper, partner at Farrer & Co
• Dorothy Dalton, editor of Governance
• Colin Nee, trustee of the New Economics Foundation and the Karen Woo Foundation
• Bob Reitemeier CBE, chief executive of the Essex Community Foundation
The Hallmarks of Excellence are:
1. Leadership: Inspiration in the pursuit of your objectives, galvanising action within your team and encouraging others by example.
2. People development: A commitment to developing and motivating staff and volunteers at all levels in your organisation.
3. Planning: Developing and following a robust project plan, which is sufficiently detailed but also flexible and responsive to events.
4. Innovation: Imaginative and creative use of original or adapted ideas and techniques. This could involve the application to your work of concepts first applied in other organisations or sectors.
5. Enterprise: New ways of raising new funds or building support, especially from non-traditional sources. New methods of controlling costs, especially administration costs.
6. Learning: A culture of sharing learning and responsiveness to changing needs and attitudes.
7. Impact measurement: The use of appropriate techniques to measure the impact of your activity or organisation.
8. Effectiveness: Being able to show with evidence that you are achieving or exceeding your intended results or ‘outcomes’ and that these results are being achieved cost-effectively.
9. Accountability: A commitment to communicating with volunteers, staff, funders, beneficiaries and the public so that they can understand and influence the progress of your project or initiative and how it meets its objectives.
10. Sustainability: Elements in the management of a project or initiative which will ensure that it takes on a life of its own after the initial input of resources and/or management effort
