There is a myth about the national character that Australians are inward-looking about humanitarian aid. Yet while governments go on reducing their promised proportion of GNP to overseas aid, World Vision, as the largest overseas relief and development non government organisation, has been developing and partnering a powerful constituency for giving. Eighty-four percent of Australians support the concept of foreign aid. Fifty-one percent believe Australia has a responsibility to provide aid to third world countries. This market is as surprisingly varied as it is large. For World Vision it is the legions of Australian school children who discover experientially what it is to be poor and hungry through the World Vision 40 Hour Famine, the single largest fundraising event and a national phenomenon – these children will be tomorrow’s Australians with a conscience. It is the thousands of families and individuals who sponsor children in the world’s poorest countries. It is donors and people who remember World Vision in their wills. It is corporates who have both compassion and a marketer’s feel for Australia’s real concerns in the world. Nevertheless, this market still has potential for development. It is estimated that only 30 percent of Australians give money to support relief and development overseas. Through partnership and participation, World Vision is effectively tackling issues related to relief and long-term development – poverty, income generating projects, malnutrition, rehabilitation, health, education, food, security and Indigenous Programs. It is a market of Australians working with World Vision to create a world that no longer tolerates poverty.
	Building a constituency for overseas aid is one thing, creating a belief that something can be done about world poverty is another. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the World Vision brand is not only its success in growing to become Australia’s largest international aid and development agency – and by so doing helping more people who live in desperate poverty – but in giving a human face to overseas need. The World Vision brand name is recognised by 86 percent of consumers and World Vision Child Sponsorship has played no small role in this achievement. Child Sponsorship has convinced Australians that the true starting point for any humane development is children. It has created relationships with those who are suffering, making the act of giving vivid, real and rewarding. Today, photographs of sponsored children take pride of place in the homes of around 164,000 Australians. Yet Child Sponsorship is only one of World Vision’s responses to suffering. In disasters and emergencies around the globe, Australians have trusted World Vision to deliver emergency relief provided by their donations – to famines in Ethiopia and Rwanda, Hurricane ‘Mitch’ in Honduras and to Papua New Guinea where a tsunami wiped out villages on a 40 kilometre front. Backed by solid support from donors, World Vision swung into action with immediate short-term relief plus a plan for longer-term assistance. Within weeks of the tragedy in Papua New Guinea, World Vision found itself delivering aid to flood victims in Bangladesh and bringing relief measures for millions after flooding in China affected a quarter of the world’s most populous nation. World Vision not only responds to crises, but stays for the long haul. When the peace keepers pull out, World Vision fights on for the children, their families and communities. When the food drops stop, World Vision helps people begin raising crops. When war teaches children to kill, World Vision teaches them to read. World Vision Australia’s marketing has achieved international recognition. At a recent major awards ceremony in Chicago, judged against fundraising from over 30 countries, World Vision’s campaign ‘Who has the Vision?’ won Gold, top prize, and Silver for magazine and television advertising. World Vision has also received numerous Fundraising Institute Awards and Quality Service Awards. Another achievement is World Vision’s success in focusing attention on issues. World Vision helped spearhead the movement to ban landmines. An intense campaign generated over 15,000 responses from supporters and members of the general public. Prime Minister John Howard agreed to sign the treaty on behalf of Australia. Campaigns on issues such as the tragedy of the Girl-Child in third world countries, Children-of-War and Child Labour have made World Vision the champion of the Rights of the Child.
	While World Vision has grown to provide around $70 million in overseas aid, it has never grown beyond its focus on children. World Vision began in Australia in 1966, but can trace its roots to concern for one child, a little girl, just after the Korean War finished in 1950. An American, Dr Bob Pierce, was horrified by the plight of a girl in a Korean orphanage, lacking food or rudimentary health care. So he persuaded a number of Americans to ‘sponsor’ the children – by each giving a monthly donation to meet the needs of one child. The idea caught on. Soon it spread beyond institutions to very poor children in urban slums and rural villages. It also changed its nature. Sponsorship became a source of funds for development projects that improved life for the whole community, rather than simply providing day-to-day care for one individual child. Over the years, World Vision has become an international, Christian organisation, active in more than 100 countries, providing emergency relief, child care and community development programs throughout Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East and Eastern Europe.
	World Vision’s main product is World Vision – a vision for a better world. It is a vision of action. Serving this vision are individual products that each work towards creating a world that no longer tolerates poverty. The centrepiece is World Vision Child Sponsorship, but other dynamic products are Pledge Programs, 40 Hour Famine, Corporate Giving, Gifts in Kind, Cause Related Marketing and Corporate Citizenship. Combined, these products impact on millions of Australians. Through World Vision Child Sponsorship alone, around 164,000 Australians actively support 181,000 children, their families and communities. In the 40 Hour Famine, around half a million people raise approximately $6 million to provide assistance to famine victims in Sudan, India, Uganda, Zambia, Mozambique, Myanmar, North Korea, Ethiopia and the Philippines.
	In addition to the ongoing work of delivering aid and initiating development where needed, World Vision has embraced a challenging new vision statement – “Working for a world that no longer tolerates poverty”. Another milestone of change is the introduction of a new corporate identity – a logo which, with its star/cross, symbolises hope. A recent development is a marketing campaign designed to build trust and confidence in aid and development work. It thanks Australians for joining World Vision in no longer tolerating world poverty and furnishes surprising facts about the impact, effectiveness and efficiency of World Vision’s programs around the world. Championing the Rights of the Child, World Vision continues to mount powerful media campaigns against the injustices of the Girl-Child, Child Labour and Children-of-War. Community Heath Care with indigenous people was yet one more Australian first. World Vision is also breaking new ground in lobbying key advocacy issues and engaging in Government and collaborative efforts.
	World Vision projects an integrated vision through Television Commercials, Community Service Announcements, Direct Mail, Telemarketing, TV Specials, Radio, Printed Media (magazine, newspapers and inserts), Electronic Mail, Joint Promotions, Cause Related Marketing and the 40 Hour Famine.
	World Vision is a Christian organisation reaching out to a hurting world and today is identified by consumers (unsolicited) as the most trusted and efficient overseas aid agency. The corporate world is discovering that such a caring brand equity can, through support, add value to its own image, generating a powerful message of goodwill amongst its consumers, employees and competitors, establishing a standard of global ethics, values and sound corporate citizenship. Seventy-six percent of consumers prefer to buy a product or service that is associated with a cause, such as World Vision, and 59 percent say they would switch brands to do so. Eighty-three percent say that it is good for companies to involve themselves in Cause Related Marketing, with 61 percent saying they would be more likely to stay loyal to a company involved in Cause Marketing. It is an opportunity to gain new customers, achieve higher affinity levels and provide a competitive advantage. Corporates are partnering World Vision through Gifts in Kind and cash donations. World Vision offers a variety of donation packages, one being joint promotion. A good example of a World Vision corporate Gifts in Kind partnership is the Uncle Toby’s “Breakfast for the Kids” campaign. For every one kilo of tropical muesli purchased by World Vision, Uncle Toby’s donated two more. The amount of muesli shipped to Romania will provide breakfast for 1300 children for one year. Another donation opportunity is leverage buying – World Vision purchases much needed items at a heavily reduced rate.

WORLD VISION
		World Vision International operates in more than 100 countries benefiting over 72 million people through 4300 projects.
		At the end of 1998, 164,000 Australians were supporting 181,000 children, their families and communities through Child Sponsorship.
		In 1998, over 20 Australians were working in overseas locations for World Vision Australia.
		Through supporters, child sponsors, 40 Hour Famine participants, donors and advocates – World Vision Australia was able to deliver aid and relief in 1998 valued at almost $77 million.
		World Vision began in September 1950 when Korean war correspondent, Dr Bob Pierce, returned home to the United States with a vision  and a determination to link children in need with caring supporters.