The Relief Fund For Romania

The Relief Fund for Romania was founded by leading Romanian exiles from Communism led by Ion Ratiu (1917-2000), distinguished Romanian diplomat, entrepreneur, publisher, writer and humanitarian. He devoted his life to the fight for democracy in Romania. Ion Ratiu also co-founded Amnesty International with British lawyer Peter Beneson.

click on the logo above to transfer to the Relief Fund for Romania's own web site.

Street child As Ceaucescu's disastrous regime collapsed, Ratiu set up a charity to aid the terrible plight of the children and adults in the orphanages and psychiatric hospitals. The Relief Fund for Romania was the major focal point of the UK's generous aid response.

"...Our teams work daily on the streets together with the local Department of Child Protection in an outreach programme. It identifies homeless children very early in their life on the street before they succumb to the inevitable risks of substance abuse and criminality.

We offer food, friendship and support to each street child before they are admitted to our refuge. We also provide 'drop-in' day care facilities for children who do not wish to be admitted so that they still have access to medical care, showers, food and support services...."

The PEACE Fund is very proud to be associated with the Relief Fund for Romania and its ongoing work to aid and assist children in need.

Why did The PEACE Fund chosen a Romanian charity?

street child asleep Studies by UNICEF, Ministry of Labour Romania and the Bureau of International Labour Affairs May 2004 estimated the following:

that over 6,000 children are living on the streets;
that every 5th Romanian child is exploited: some 900,000 of the approximately 5 million children of Romania are forced to work. Approximately 300,000 of these are forced to perform extremely hard manual labour;
Northeastern Romania - where Relief Fund for Romania has many of its community-based projects - was recently described as "the absolute poverty pole of Europe";
95% of Romanian households in some parts of the northeast have no running water, 10% cannot afford to connect to the electricity supply and there are no social services - other than those provided by Relief Fund for Romania - for an area of 24,000 people;
with 18 deaths per 1,000 babies born alive, Romania has the 3rd highest infant mortality rate in Europe after Albania (37) and Ukraine (21).

Adrian was able to see the situation first hand while filming Highlander:EndGame in 1999 and has, since that time, awaited an opportunity to do something tangible to help make a difference in the lives of at least some of these children. That time has now arrived.

January 2007 - The PEACE Fund donates $20,000

We repeat our sincere thank you to Mr Adrian Paul and all his friends at The Peace Fund. We are only a small charity a long way from the USA in a distant corner of Romania. To have the help from you in this way for our children who are in such need is truly heartwarming. Thank you."

Gabriela Achihai, President , Fundatia de Sprijin Comunitar

The donation has been used to increase the salaries of the specialists:

Educators (6 people): from 112 GBP to 150 GBP (net) per month
Psychologist: from 150GBP to 180 GBP (net) per month
Social worker: from 125 GBP to 175 GBP (net) per month

This adjustment was desperately needed as the employees were starting to look for work in other places (businesses, abroad or NGOs). These are highly trained staff who as you can see are paid very little. The extra funds were then used to help two families from very poor villages to improve their houses and so keep their children at home.

And in addition it was used to:

Buy new spring shoes for all the children. Shoes are, in general, big problems! The children go through many pairs in a year.
Organize 3 picnic trips around Bacau: the children love going out and have barbeques and play football.
Buy new special eye glasses for one of the boys.

Fundatia de Sprijin Comunitar (FSC)

FSC win award Fundatia de Sprijin Comunitar (FSC) are major partners of the Fund, having worked closely with them for the past 10 years.

On Wednesday 14th November 2007 at Athene Palace Hilton from Bucuresti took place the 5th edition of "People for People Gala", event that recognizes the efforts of companies, NGOs or individuals in activities of volunteerism, fundraising or campaigns.

Fundatia de Sprijin Comunitar applied with the project "Volunteers for rural areas” (summer school in Podu Turcului), under the section Campaigns for Public Volunteerism. The proposed project was organized during the summer and it meant the active participation of 30 young volunteers in educational and enrichment activities with over 300 children from 3 of the poorest villages in Bacau County. FSC’s project competed against many other projects proposed by important national organizations.

The jury, however, decided that our project was the best and awarded it for most excellent programme and public volunteering campaign from Romania in 2007.

The campaign “You can be Father Christmas” started!

Presents for Christmas The idea came last year when FSC received over 350 letters from poor children from the villages all addressed to the big man.

Last year they managed to find 50 people that agreed to buy presents according to the wish list from the letters.

FSC organized a caravan and a “real” Father Christmas distributed the presents causing a big surprise to the children.

At the time of writing this update they have received many hundreds of letters which will make Christmas 2007 very special to many more children.