2010 Asia 21 Public Service Award Finalists Announced
The Top 5 Finalists for the 2010 Asia 21 Public Service Award are finalized
The 2010 Asia 21 Fellows and the Asia Society are pleased to announced the finalists for this year's Asia 21 Public Service Award. The selection process has been extremely competitive this year, and we have selected together five outstanding Finalists. The winner will be presented the award at the Asia 21 Young Leaders Summit, which will take place at the InterContinental Hotel, Jakarta, Indonesia from December 3-5, 2010. For more information about the Summit, click here; for more information about the Public Service Award and past winners, click here.
The Finalists are:
Caring & Living As Neighbours (CLAN)
CLAN is an Australian-based, not-for-profit, non-governmental organisation (NGO), approved by AusAID for Overseas Aid Gift Deductibility Status (OAGDS) and the Australian Taxation Office for Tax Deductibility Status. CLAN is dedicated to the dream that all children living with chronic health conditions in resource-poor countries of the world will enjoy a quality of life on par with that of their neighbours in wealthier countries. CLAN's efforts are based on a rights-based, community development model that provides a strategic framework for action (the 5 pillars) to help children who are living with chronic health conditions in resource-poor countries.
Glocal Ventures focuses its overseas efforts on serving the people of Vietnam. Whenever possible, volunteers are encouraged to use their vocations, skills, and passions to make a difference in Vietnam. Volunteers serve alongside a community to help people work together in interdependency, taking charge of their situations and moving towards a more empowered and satisfying life as individuals and community. Our strategy for mobilizing volunteers is based on careful needs-assessment in the host country and at the level of the beneficiary. GVI also promotes domain engagement (see diagram), where volunteers are encouraged to use their vocations to make an impact on the corresponding domain in Vietnam.GVI is based in Keller, TX, (in the Dallas-Fort Worth area) and has a representative office in Hanoi. It is registered in the US as a 501c(3) non-profit organization.
The Humanitarian Organisation for Migration Economics (H.O.M.E.)
There are some 800,000 migrant workers or more in Singapore and H.O.M.E. has provided direct assistance to more than 50,000 men and women migrants and victims of human trafficking and forced labour, who availed of our programmes and services. Among those helped included migrants affected by the Tsunami disaster in 2005 and the present global economic crisis in 2008/2009. On one occasion, we provided shelter for 15 Indonesian women and their children, who were abandoned at sea by seamen. Our stories of assistance are as varied as the sufferings and the wounds inflicted upon our beneficiaries.
The Hapinoy Store Program focuses on the sari-sari stores in the Philippines (sari-sari is the Filipino word for “many or various kinds”), small neighborhood convenience stores or retail-based outlets that sell various things, mostly basic commodities. These kinds of stores are almost always located within or as an extension of the storeowner’s home. With about 700,000 stores in the country, sari-sari stores make up 30 to 40% of total retail sales in the Philippines. Hapinoy is managed by MicroVentures Incorporated (MVI). MVI aspires to be the leading partners of micro entrepreneurs in the Philippines. In so doing, MVI leverages micro financing as a powerful tool to empower socially and economically challenged families. In 2007, MicroVentures Incorporated launched the Hapinoy Store Program with microfinance borrowers in mind. Upon realizing that 15 to 20% of microfinance borrowers use the capital to put up stores or expand their inventory, the Hapinoy Store Program first focused on aggregating all these sari-sari store owners for bulk product discounts.
Pathways is a new and innovative social involvement program that identifies bright but financially-underpriveleged public high school students and equips them with the necessary skills, both academic and non-academic, to ensure they get a fair chance at a college education. What separates Pathways from other scholarship programs is our holistic approach in addressing the problem in public education.Recognizing the vital role parents play in the education and upbringing of their children, we provide values formation and livelihood training opportunities for the parents of our student participants. This contributes to a home environment that is more conducive to learning and growing.