Giving back to the Future

“The future of the world lies with the chil­dren. It’s on the moth­er to hold the child so tight­ly that they under­stand this is their world. It’s on the father to carry the child onto the high­est moutain so that they can see their world for real.”

Proverb of the Maya, Guatemala’s indige­nous population

Valdivia: Commit­ted to Help­ing the Chil­dren of Guatemala

At Valdivia, the future is our mission. We support careers and enter­pris­es. At the same time, we watch our chil­dren grow up and look into the future. This is how the wish came up to provide a future for chil­dren who grow up under far less favourable condi­tions – as the street chil­dren of Guatemala do.

Many fami­lies, espe­cial­ly single moth­ers, find them­selves unable to feed all their chil­dren. Other hard­ships include the death of one or both parents. Chil­dren are left behind with­out any help whatsovev­er, fight­ing to survive every single day while being exposed to all sorts of violence. They beg, steal, or roam garbage dumps for food. Help­ing these chil­dren, enabling them to have a happy child­hood and live a life in digni­ty with a future perspec­tive, is what the ”Aldea Infan­til“ children’s village is all about.

The Children’s Future Project ”Aldea Infantil“

The foun­da­tion has been running the children’s village ”Aldea Infan­til“ in the high­lands of Guatemala since 1991. Today, it provides protec­tion and a place to call their home to 160 chil­dren and youths; they can grow up in peace and safe­ty. In fami­ly groups, a house moth­er is taking loving care of them while the foudation’s own school provides them with a sound educa­tion, both acad­e­m­ic and voca­tion­al. For the small­est ones, there is a nurs­ery and every­body has access to full-scale medical care. The children’s village will take care of the chil­dren until they have finished school educa­tion or their job train­ing and are ready to live their lives inde­pe­dent­ly. Some even make it to univer­si­ty and will be support­ed by the foun­da­tion on this way as well.

100 Per Cent for the Children

One thing was impor­tant when we opted to support this specif­ic project: a reli­able fund­ing organ­i­sa­tion – not the easi­est to find, as we came to real­ize. In the end, it was the open­ness and trans­paren­cy of the Stiftung Kinderzukun­ft (Children’s Future Foun­da­tion) which left the biggest impres­sion with us. It was found­ed by well-known furni­ture maker Rudolf Walther in 1981 and is locat­ed in Gruen­dau near Hanau. So person­al contact is possi­ble at all times. The foundation’s endow­ment is 5.7 million euros, dona­tions amount­ed to almost 3.8 million euros in 2020. The guid­ing prin­ci­ple is that 100 per cent of each dona­tion will go to the chil­dren; admin­is­tra­tion cost will be covered by gain­ings from the  endow­ment and purpose-specif­ic dona­tions only.

Help­ing togeth­er, Joy for Everybody

At Valdivia, every­body – staff members as well as the manage­ment – contributes to the support for “Aldea Infan­til“. And togeth­er we were speech­less when, in early 2022, congrat­u­la­tions for our 1st anniver­sary came rolling on: The chil­dren of “our“ house had creat­ed pictures for us and had turned the anniver­sary into a real party – for them­selves in Guatemala as well as for us in Frankfurt/Main!

And so we invite our customers and contacts to join us in support­ing the Stiftung Kinderzukun­ft. Options are sundry:

• Dona­tions in money and in kind
• Contribut­ing foun­da­tions, shel­tered foundations
• Spon­sor­ship for indi­vid­ual chil­dren, a village, or a project
• Inher­i­tance, spon­sor­ing, co-oper­a­tions, etc

The foun­da­tion runs children’s villages in Guatemala, Roma­nia, Bosnia and Herze­gov­ina, as well as  aid projects in Thai­land, Sambia and Jakar­ta. All spend­ings are made trans­par­ent in year­ly reports, broken down to every single euro. Inter­est­ed parties have the possi­bil­i­ty to come and visit the children’s village right there.

Stiftung Kinderzukun­ft (The Children’s Future Foundation)
Rabenaus­traße 1a, D‑63584 Grün­dau, Germany
Hans-Georg Bayer
Manag­ing Directors

Fon +49 (0) 60 51/48 18–14
Fax +49 (0) 60 51/48 18–10

hans-georg.bayer@kinderzukunft.de
www.kinderzukunft.de

Dona­tions to: Commerzbank Hanau
IBAN: DE79 5064 0015 0222 2222 00 BIC: COBADEFFXXX