Social Impact
Globalization looms over us, but we should be aware of the challenges facing us that could stop globalization in its tracks. RheinBrücke’s support of social impact work is motivated by eye-opening facts such as these. With nearly 1 billion hungry people in the world, about 21,000 children under the age of 5 died every day in 2010. The highest rates of child mortality are in sub-Saharan Africa, a rate more than 17 times the average for developed regions. More than 750 million people do not have sustainable access to safe drinking water; another 2.5 billion lack access to improved sanitation facilities.
Against this background, the SOS Children’s Villages readily handles situations where:
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Children at the risk of losing parental care; when their basic material, emotional, health and educational needs are being neglected, or they are abused; or in cases where their care-givers lack the capacity or commitment to adequately care for them.
We found that SOS was a perfect remedy for children who lack or have lost their parental care and this supported of our primary objective to help make a tangible, lasting and prominent contribution to the world in which we live. We are firmly convinced that together we can achieve more than any of us could individually. SOS runs over 2,300 programs catering to more than one million children and adults globally.
Strengthening Families
SOS Family Strengthening Programs help keep children in the care of their family. Under the auspices of SOS, disadvantaged families at risk of separation are encouraged to regain their capacity to protect and care for their children.
Individual Plans for Every Child
Children who cannot be cared for by their biological families are supported by family-based caregivers either with foster families or within SOS Children’s Villages. SOS families provide individualized care to promote the development, education and health of each child. They provide over 80,000 children and youth with family-based care. In partnership with communities SOS develops local infrastructure and run kindergartens, day care centres, schools, vocational training centres and medical facilities.