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Just $30 a month from a Vinnies’ conference – the usual contribution – goes a long way in the
developing world.
By Tom Britt
The St Vincent de Paul Society, wherever it is found, provides material assistance through its
volunteers as a first step in the care and support of those in need.
It is able in the developed world to marshal and apply considerable resources for this purpose, but the paucity of these resources in the
developing world is a serious restriction, resulting in severe limitations to the numbers of needy families that can be assisted by local conferences.
Recognising these limitations placed on many overseas
conferences, the Society in Australia, and other parts of the developed world, encourages its volunteers and members to make a contribution to less fortunate brothers and sisters.
‘Twinning’ is a program
that is run by the Society’s volunteers to assist disadvantaged neighbours in the developing world.
Twinning generally occurs at the conference level. Most conferences in Australia are twinned with one or
more conferences in Asia or the Pacific.
The arrangement has three important elements – a spiritual bond with each twin praying for the other; a cultural bond built up through regular correspondence; and a
financial bond by which the conference members and volunteers provide a monthly contribution and gifts at Easter and Christmas.
The Australian conference may also help the overseas conference by financing a
special project that is designed to meet an urgent need and which will assist the poor recipients in some way to become self-supporting.
The St Philip’s Conference at Kotara South (Newcastle) has funded two
special projects in recent years for its Indian twins. The first of these projects was in the town of Dindigul, India.
Dindigul, with a population of 25,000, is 350km south-west of Madras. Its literacy rate
is around 40 per cent and it has about 50 per cent unemployment rate.
The parish of St Joseph’s in Dindigul includes a number of women who have undertaken a tailoring course but have had little opportunity
to use their skills because of the high unemployment rate.
In response to these problems, the local conference sought assistance to set up a self-employment project to assist women with tailoring skills.
This involved the purchase and distribution of 10 sewing machines to suitable recipients who would work on an individual basis producing garments for sale.
A reasonable amount of the profit would be
returned to the conference until each machine was fully paid for with no interest.
Most of the money returned to the conference would be used to buy additional machines to expand the project, which would be
self-supporting once established.
The Kotara South conference organised a parish appeal in conjunction with its winter appeal and volunteers and members quickly over-subscribed the required funds.
Mrs
Amalie Jaganathan, president of the Dindigul conference, recently wrote: “Our tailoring machine project is going by schedule and having smooth sailing. We have been able to collect from the distribution of sewing
machines and distribute to very many others. God bless you for your help.”
Last year the Kotara South conference received a request from its second twin, the St Thomas conference, at Duuvar, which is about
200km north north-west of Madras and has a population of 2,000 people.
Employment in Duuvar is mainly in agriculture with an emphasis on manual skills. There is little work to be had during the monsoon
season when labourers must go afield to find work or borrow at high interest rates from landlords and moneylenders.
The St Vincent de Paul conference in Duuvar was keen to use the background in agricultural
skills to set up a buffalo project.
The aim was to purchase and distribute eight buffalo to eight needy families. The buffalo milk would provide sustenance for the family and excess milk could be sold and
food purchased. It was envisaged that this would provide as much as $A12 per month for each family involved.
Each of the recipient families would return the first female buffalo calf to the Society for
distribution to other needy families so, again, the project would be ongoing and self-supporting.
The total cost of this project was $A1,700 of which the Australian twin’s contribution was $A1,550.
Kotara South conference was able to finance this project using excess funds from its first twinning project.
The projects funded by volunteers in the Kotara South parish are duplicated again and again by
conferences throughout Australia and the developed world. Twinning enables members and volunteers to share their faith, possessions and cultures and establish strong partnerships which support disadvantaged
international neighbours.
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