International Council

Due to the pandemic, our disaster responses look different, but the American Red Cross is still there for people in need. With home fires being the most substantial disaster threat Americans face, taking the lives of seven people every day, our volunteer responders are supporting families displaced. For disasters big and small, whenever possible, the Red Cross is providing emergency hotel lodging in lieu of traditional sheltering, as well as meals and snacks to residents sheltering in hotels, while ensuring that social distancing and safe food handling protocols are followed. Health services volunteers call disaster survivors to ask screening questions for COVID-19 and find out about immediate needs, such as replacement medications, mental health support and spiritual care. To assess storm damage, the American Red Cross partners with local governments and utilizes satellite technology to limit in-person contact while assessing home fire and/or storm damage. 

Every two seconds, someone in America needs lifesaving blood, and the American Red Cross must collect more than 13,000 units each day. To inspire blood donations and to adapt to the needs of those affected by Covid-19, the Red Cross has committed to test all blood, platelet and plasma donations for COVID-19 antibodies, which may indicate that the donor’s immune system has produced antibodies to the coronavirus (results available to donors within 7-10 days). In addition, COVID-19 survivors have rolled up their sleeves to give their antibody-rich plasma, enabling the Red Cross to collect and distribute over 20,000 lifesaving convalescent plasma products to hospitals nationwide. Tiffany Circle members have served as volunteers at blood, platelet and plasma donation centers, checking the temperatures of each potential donor. Members continue to invest in our biomedical mission, and in FY22 will be asked to support the important work that the American Red Cross leads in the fight against cancer.  

Several Tiffany Circle Members continue to fund and serve as volunteers for the Measles & Rubella Initiative. FY21 was a challenging year for the Measles & Rubella initiative in the face of a global pandemic, but we’ve continued to make some headway. We’ve adapted our outreach strategies to protect our workers and those we serve while continuing this lifesaving work. In FY21 we visited more than 1.3 million households across 4 countries and mobilized more than 6,600 volunteers. These volunteers went door to door in communities to encourage people to bring their children to participate in community vaccination events. Meanwhile we also helped support the purchase of more than 300,000 doses of the Measles & Rubella vaccine. Our experts in the Measles and Rubella Initiative have also partnered with COVAX – an effort to ensure COVID-19 vaccines reach people around the world- to provide technical guidance on behalf of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. Overall, more than 2.9 billion children have been vaccinated in 88 countries.

Donations have supported implementing a Disaster Ready Community Model for our ten priority countries: Bangladesh, Colombia, El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Myanmar, Nepal, Philippines, and Vietnam

Tiffany Circle members also support our active duty military, veterans and their families. Every day, the Red Cross provides nearly 1,100 services to our nation’s heroes through our Hero Care Network

Finally, communities across the country are safer because of members who have been trained in health and safety courses. On average, more than 17,000 times a day, a person receives lifesaving Red Cross health and safety training and information.

Building on this impact, the Tiffany Circle aims to be a best-in-class women’s philanthropy program in support of the Red Cross. The group’s strategic plan focuses on mission support, leveraging women in philanthropy, diversity, equity and inclusion, and education and outreach.  

This project was funded solely by TC funds at a cost of CAD 1.5 million. The First Nations of Canada are recognized to be more vulnerable to natural disasters, injury, family violence and suicide. The CRC developed a First Nations strategy to enhance relationships and partnerships between the Red Cross and First Nations in order to build community capacity and improve health and safety. Three satellite Red Cross offices were placed in First Nation communities and RC programs were offered, along with the recruitment and training of volunteers in emergency management. This campaign wrapped up in 2019 and has been carried on by the Canadian Red Cross Indigenous programs.

This project was funded solely by TC funds at a cost of CAD 1 million. This campaign was funded to extend the reach of the CRC Respect Education program to new communities and to enable the program to be offered in both English and French. This highly successful campaign has evolved into Violence and Prevention in Indigenous communities.

Mothers, new-borns and young children around the world -- the majority in developing countries -- are becoming ill and dying unnecessarily. Shockingly, one woman dies every 2 minutes of complications during pregnancy or childbirth. More than 8 children die every minute from preventable illnesses like pneumonia, diarrhoea, and malaria. Since 2004, CRC has worked to improve health in 24 developing countries, directly reaching over 13 million mothers and children and benefiting their communities as a whole. Countries included in more recent work are Mali, Liberia, South Sudan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Haiti, Jordan, Syria and Nicaragua.

Support has included: vaccines to prevent diseases; micronutrient supplements to combat malnutrition; oral-rehydration salts and zinc tablets for diarrhoea; bed nets to prevent malaria; antibiotics for pneumonia; skilled birth attendants at and after delivery; medication and compression devices to slow or stop post-partum haemorrhaging.

The Tiffany Circle Match program was created when Direct Mail colleagues approached the Major Giving team as they found themselves in need of a financial supporter for their summer mailing match. The vision was that the direct-mail and accompanying digital campaign would reach over one million Canadians - and by providing a match, the Tiffany Circle would create a halo effect with the potential to inspire generosity and increase overall giving. Additionally, the Tiffany Circle would be promoted in the mailing, with an invitation extended to like-minded women who were interested in joining.

Thanks to the generosity of the Tiffany Circle, the Canadian Red Cross (CRC) has been able to adapt and respond to the pandemic since the very beginning. Our role has changed and evolved over time – from deploying our Emergency Field Hospital in Canada for the very first time to providing clinical and non-clinical support to vaccination efforts across the country.

We are working with the International Committee of the Red Cross on an innovative approach to bring lifesaving care to remote conflict zones. Through a combination of basic health information, supplies and treatments delivered by trained Red Crescent volunteers, we avoid preventable deaths from diseases such as diarrhoea, malaria and pneumonia. The program has been successfully piloted in South Soudan and the Central African Republic and will expand to more communities in 2022.

The Tiffany Circle was instrumental in setting up the ‘Your Space’ project which provides accommodation, casework and support to survivors immediately exiting exploitative situations. We have found through giving people space and time to consider their options they are better able to make informed decisions about their future. We now have three Anti-Trafficking Officers working across the UK providing ‘Your Space’ support and complex casework. 

This project increases the economic empowerment and resilience of disaster-prone communities, helping to reduce the risk of violence and exploitation when disasters strike; raises awareness of sexual and gender-based violence, including promoting the transformation of societal norms and values that contribute to it; and improves knowledge of psychosocial and legal support, so survivors of violence can access the assistance and advice they need to recover

This programme set up Women’s Squads – groups of female volunteers in each community – to hold awareness and educational sessions on relevant issues, such as good menstrual hygiene practices or gender-based violence. It will also support these communities by providing training to Women’s Squads on areas like first aid, helping make them a key focal point for day-to-day crises and empowering their voices in communities.

The Clean Start programme in Kenya has helped the Red Cross to bring clean water, sanitation and hygiene education to communities across Bomet, Klilifi and Taita-Taveta. The project has continued to support the construction and repair of water and sanitation infrastructure such as toilets, handwashing facilities and modern water supply systems, providing access to safe, clean water across 30 communities and schools. The Tiffany Circle also empowered local communities with hygiene knowledge, through gender-segregated and disability friendly toilets in schools.  

To address chronic hunger in Modogashe, the British Red Cross in partnership with the Kenyan Red Cross (KRCS), is taking a holistic approach to this programme, examining many different factors that are contributing to chronic hunger in Modogashe. We are working with the local communities and county governmental ministries to devise and implement solutions that are culturally appropriate and relevant to these communities. We will focus on supporting vulnerable communities to adapt to climate crises, strengthen their livelihoods and access to water and sanitation and help reduce conflict over declining natural resources. 

With support from the Tiffany Circle, the Red Cross were able to continue to provide life-changing assistance to women excluded by their families and communities following devastating sexual attacks in the DRC. We completed cash transfers to 500 women allowing them the freedom of to set up a range of different businesses based on their personal skills. Women living with children managed to provide at least two meals a day for their children and pay for their school fees.  

The Tiffany Circle is helping to support a primary health centre in Hajjah which includes an emergency obstetrics unit and the provision of ante-natal advice to mothers and support to ensure new-borns are healthy.  

YPP works to ensure best outcomes for children and families by improving the capacity of young parents with complex needs, aged 13 to 24, to live and parent independently. The program is designed to meet the needs of a highly vulnerable group in the community, namely pregnant and parenting young women and men who are unable to access the safety, security and support required to parent their child effectively. YPP takes a strengths-based early intervention approach, building the capacity of young parents to live independently in appropriate housing, develop parenting skills, ensure best outcomes for their children, and break the cycle of trauma, abuse and neglect.

Investing in building female humanitarian leadership which will not only improve outcomes for professional females in the humanitarian sector and strengthen the pipeline for future years, but also will ultimately improve humanitarian outcomes for the most vulnerable, including women and girls, in disaster and crisis situations. 

CBHFA is a program based on community development principles that trains prisoners as ‘special status’ volunteers. These volunteers are enabled through the program to provide peer-to-peer support and education in the prison setting. Volunteers are empowered through the program to identify and improve the health, wellbeing and safety of their prison community. 

The local Aboriginal community-controlled health organisation joined with Australian Red Cross to provide a strong support service to young mothers with underweight babies in the Galiwin’ku community. The Baby Hub supports the community to improve nutritional outcomes for infants, parents and carers. SWL funding will provide resource to enable Red Cross to empower the community to deliver the Baby Hub program in future and transition out of the community. 

By partnering with Vanuatu Red Cross Society (VRCS), Australian Red Cross is helping to enhance VRCS’s local leadership of humanitarian action. Support for this work provided by Society of Women Leaders is contributing towards the core costs required by VRCS to run the organisation, enabling the delivery of humanitarian services, the meeting of statutory functions and legal compliance, and progress towards a sustainable model. Such core costs include salaries and governance costs, and headquarter/branch utilities. Access to reliable core funding this year enabled Vanuatu Red Cross to pivot its operations to respond to COVID-19 and Tropical Cyclone Harold, and more easily manage the unpredictability created by the pandemic. 

In major cities like Amsterdam, the number of vulnerable women with a low economic status and limited social contacts is very high. These women are socially isolated and they often live in poverty. In many cases, their ability to realize their potential and fully participate in society is limited by their domestic situation. To break through this isolation, the Red Cross has developed a course called ‘Heroine’. The aim is to empower these women to become self-reliant, to involve them more in their local community and to end their isolation. We start out by teaching them First Aid skills, which is something they are very interested in, as it will benefit their families. Update July 2020.

Thanks to the success of the project in Amsterdam and requests from all over the country, we scaled up the project from a local to national level. From the start in 2017 until now, there have been 650 participants. The development of knowledge and skills has increased their self-confidence significantly. 88% of the women received a First Aid Certification which has enabled them to help others in need. It also increased their self-confidence.

We received a note from a woman who had saved the life of a small baby, who was choking. Thanks to the knowledge and courage she acquired during the courses, she was capable to act appropriately. This is another important outcome of the courses: it saves lives. Due to de COVID-19 crisis, the courses had to be cancelled from March. The courses have been adapted to the COVID-19 prevention-measures. Hopefully we can restart the ‘Heroine’ courses in September 2020. 

In the rural areas of Zambia more than 60% of households live on less than $1.25 per day. The poverty rate is highest among families with a female head. Many households do not have access to safe drinking water, proper sanitation and many people suffer from malnutrition. In addition, they have limited access to health and education services.

Update July 2022: With support of Tiffany Circle a mother shelter was constructed at Sasu Rural Health Centre that continued to house antenatal mothers who needed to travel longer distance to deliver at the clinic. Furthermore, it has allowed the antenatal mothers to wait for their expected date at the facility and in turn increase institution deliveries. The mothers’ shelter was handed over to the community in December 2021. A wonderful result. A new three years project ‘Access to basic health care and poverty reduction’ will start this summer, also in the eastern province of Zambia. The international workgroup is looking at co-funding this project as well.

Studies show that when women are supported and empowered, all of society benefits. Their families are healthier, more children go to school, agricultural productivity and incomes increase. Women are the key change agents to achieve the end of the negative spiral of hunger and poverty. The Zambian Red Cross has therefore developed an integrated approach to empower women, starting with increasing the women’s knowledge of health care and ensuring better access to medical services. Through trained community volunteers, women in East Zambia will receive training on health issues, safe pregnancy, child care, hygiene, nutrition and the use of fuel efficient cook stoves. Additionally, the women’s groups will set up community gardens where they can grow their own vegetables, contributing to a more varied nutrition. By installing water wells nearby, women will have better access to clean drinking water. Eventually, we will support them to develop income generating activities with micro-finance constructions. With an income, the women will be able to afford health care and education for their children. Healthy and strong women will be able to take their future into their own hands, and have a positive impact on the development of their children as well as their communities.  

Through loans, trainings, and technical assistance, in one year a first group of 15 women will develop a new source of income and set a step towards financial independence. This first-year investment provides the foundation for future impact, setting in motion a fly-wheel effect of women entrepreneurship (hopefully reaching 45 women entrepreneurs over 3 years).

The impact of this project goes beyond the participating women’s lives. Bees produce honey, but also play an important role in pollination and plant reproduction. Embedded in a larger programme that increases the resilience of communities, ecosystems, and economic activity, this beekeeping project introduces an innovative and sustainable financial mechanism to foster entrepreneurship and landscape restoration activities. It allows these women to influence market dynamics and change negative attitudes about their capacities, proving their added value to the economy. 

Update July 2022: There were some delays at the start but this project has been launched by the end of June. At this point training modules are being prepared and potential women beekeepers in the project area are being identified. Since the beginning of 2022 an apiculture specialist was recruited to follow-up on the existing bee colonies that will be rented out to the beneficiaries. Currently, there are 14 hives that are in good condition and ready to be managed by the upcoming women beekeepers. At the time of writing, the NRC is identifying a consultant to execute a honey market study in the project area, to get a clear understanding on the production capacity and market opportunities. This will provide more in-depth information on the actual potential of honey production for the community.