Background

In the Wenchuan quake on May 12th almost 7000 schools were destroyed. Several members of the Finnish Business Community expressed a wish to organize a collective charity drive to contribute to the relief efforts. A suggestion to build and donate a school in the quake stricken area was brought up. As there are numerous practical and legal issues involved with such a task, a project group was formed to research on how we could organize and execute this project.

We have now completed this task of fact-finding and planning and extend to you this invitation to become a founding member of the Finnish Charity School Project. Please see the project invitation for details on the project.

How do we build a school in Sichuan?

The re-building efforts in Sichuan are coordinated by the local governments. The international community is welcome to participate by co-operating with nationally recognized charity organizations. We have chosen the China Children's and Teenagers fund (www.cctf.org.cn), CCTF, as our partner.

CCTF is a non government charity organization that has nearly 20 years of experience in running and facilitating school building projects in China. It will provide us with a legal and organizational framework that we lack. CCTF operates "on the ground" with many donating organizations and companies. CCTF will help us select a building site to match the budget we can raise. Also, CCTF will handle communication and issues regarding permits, and other bureaucracy with local government.

CCTF does NOT deduct a management fee or anything else from your donation. However, they will provide tax-deductible receipts for the donations. CCTF is audited by Ernst & Young.

The actual building will be done by local contractors, managed by Pöyry consulting and Dr. Baisen He, a member of the project steering group and project manager with Pöyry. Pöyry Architectural services will provide all drawings for the project.

When will this happen?

In order to get started with a construction project we need to reach a minimum budget. Therefore we now invite companies interested in exercising corporate social responsibility in China to join us in our efforts. When we have reached our primary target, RMB 3.5 million, in soft commitments we will inform the donors to go ahead and make the donation contract with CCTF.

Here is a tentative timeline:

By end of October
Soft-commitments by founding members.
November 1st
Tally up the total. Confirm that the project is a ”Go”. Inform members.
By mid November
Each donor, individually, signs a donation-contract with the CCTF (tax deductible, hard-commitment).
November
The CCTF and the Steering group together select an appropriate site.
By end of November
Donations remitted to CCTF’s account.
December
Construction project started by CCTF and Pöyry.
Autumn of 2009
School construction completed.