Friends of Orphans and Vulnerable Children (FOVC)

Friends of Orphans and Vulnerable Children (FOVC) is an Ethiopian based non-profit, non-governmental and non-political humanitarian organization dedicated to bringing hope, love, and dignity to the most vulnerable children and women in Ethiopia particularly in the southern Ethiopia.

FOVC-Ethiopia was founded by a young Ethiopian Engineer, Desalegn Daka, in August 2006 with the aim of making life better for vulnerable children in Damot Pulassa district/woreda/ of Wolayta zone in SNNP region. During the past eight years, FOVC has built a strong reputation for community-based, integrated child care and development programming, with programmatic expertise in child education and nutrition; health and personal hygiene care; water and sanitation; malaria prevention; women’s empowerment (through poultry and animal husbandry, crops farming, business skills trainings, and handcrafting projects); and capacity building of the organization. FOVC has experience working in three districts in the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region (SNNPR).

We have focused on providing support to OVCs through the structures of schools. This has included:

• a service for finding foster homes or extended families for such orphans through which over 200 orphans have been placed in safe homes;
• a house-to-house visiting program to encourage foster families;
• a feeding program in schools;
• an educational materials support like school uniforms, exercise books, pens and pencils;
• a girls and women empowerment project for female-headed households to help them keep their families together;
• a health and personal hygiene care service;
• a sanitation and environmental improvement initiative in schools;
• a water wells development project to improve access to clean water; and
• an education project for caregivers, social workers and teachers to help them deal with the challenges of having orphans in schools and classes.

FOVC envisions a future where children and women in southern Ethiopia live healthy, happy, and productive lives.

FOVC’s mission is to educate and support vulnerable children and empower poor women in southern Ethiopia, so that they able to overcome poverty and become healthy, responsible, productive, and happy individuals.