Plan (aid organisation)

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Plan

Type	Charity
Founded	1937, Spain
Headquarters	Surrey, United Kingdom
Key people	John Langdon-Davies Eric Muggeridge
Industry	development aid
Revenue	$341 Million USD (June 2002-2003)
Employees	? (worldwide)
Slogan	n/a.
Website	www.plan-international.org

Plan, also known as Foster Parents Plan in some countries, is a child-oriented charity, and works in 46 countries to provide programs to 1.3 million children and their families. It was originally founded by journalist John Langdon-Davies. The organisation has no political or religious affiliations. It is active primarily in developing countries in Central and South America, Africa, and South and Southeast Asia, with a staff of over 6,000 worldwide, and a further volunteer force in excess of 50,000. Plan operates long-term to address health, education, shelter, and livelihood issues in the communities in which it operates.

Plan operates on the basis of sponsorship of individual children. Benefactors can correspond with the child they 'adopt' by mail, thus creating a personal bond between donor and child. The sponsorship system ensures that the sponsors can see what their money is going towards, and know that it is properly spent. Sponsorship aims to raise awareness about, as well as funds for, the communities Plan works with.

However this method also led to controversy because the funds do not end up in the child's pocket for safety reasons – they are used to finance projects that benefit the entire community in which the child lives, this offers the opportunity of school and health services to the sponsor child, as well as their community. In 1999 research on 350,000 'adopted' children showed that 4% of these children were dead, missing or non-existent. These findings are contested because of the open system Plan works on, offering each sponsor the opportunity to communicate with and visit their sponsor child, as well as receiving an update on the progress of their sponsor child and community twice a year.

In 2001 a Dutch government commission concluded that Foster Parents spent only 50% of its money to aid projects and the rest to organisational costs. After publication of this report FPP lost 11,000 donors. However later surveys have found that over 80% of Plan's funds go to the communities, and the remaining to essential running costs – this sum is comparable to most organisations of its size.

According to its 2005 financial statement Plan spends 81.2% of its budget on programs which benefit children, their families and communities, with 8.4% going to fundraising and a further 10.4% to administration and operation. [1] Plan employs chuggers, whose high fees may explain a part of this percentage.

In 2006, Plan International Australia was appointed the Goodwill Partner of the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games

Hear My Voice is a Plan sponsored television show broadcast on Aurora Community Television. It is a series of short films produced, directed and filmed by Plan-assisted youth media clubs in the developing world.

In 2005 Plan lost 11% in donations compared to 2004 in the Netherlands, still receiving 44.2 million. Three years before the organisation had been making 74 million in donations.

In September 2006 the Dutch government cut 144 million euros in funding from Foster Parents Plan, approximately one third of its entire budget. The aid organisations eligible for funding are checked for quality of management, community support and ability to fund at least 25% of the projects itself. As a response to this a representative of the organisation said the organisation's existence is not in question.

In 2006 Plan UK scooped the top honour in the category of the ‘top 100 UK fundraising charities’ at the Charities Online Accounts Awards