What about the dangers of in-kind giving?
Traditionally, many organisations have preferred financial provision after experiences of inappropriate in-kind applications.
- Inappropriate goods…
- Culturally inappropriate goods convey disrespect and offence to those who receive them. Meat products, for example, may be sent to communities who are traditionally vegetarian, immodest clothing sent to conservative ethnic groups, and so on.
- Inappropriate donations can cause damage to the local economy. There is no way, for example, any emerging economy can compete when aid floods its market with product.
- Unsolicited containers may clog up harbours or other ports of entry. In the case of disasters, for example, unsolicited cargo often comprises up to 50% of the aid that clogs ports and airports. This becomes a major problem for two reasons. First, the goods must be disposed of and that can be costly, eating up valuable financial resources. Second, these goods may prevent ready passage of goods that are truly needed.
- Appropriate goods…
While scenarios such as the above make financial support ideal in certain circumstances, Global Hand still sees it essential to harness non-financial resources, where appropriate, because, at this point in world history, there is simply not enough money available to win the battle against global need. Dollars are not getting the job done.
We do not believe we can afford to turn our back on the massive goodwill available in non-financial resources while unabated human suffering continues on such a large scale.
To avoid the inappropriate placement of goods, however, Global Hand is committed to developing Standards of Best Practice. Examples of Global Hand’s practice include the following.
- Cultural appropriateness may be subtle, but, in a networking context, well supported. Post tsunami, for example, vitamin tablets designated for a strongly Islamic part of Indonesia were found to be made from a casing containing pork elements. Rather than have the vitamins cause cultural offence, Global Hand found partners who could re-direct these to more appropriate partners for distribution within Indonesia.
- In post-disaster times, an outpouring of goodwill is inevitable but may result in unsuitable aid. Global Hand, for example, was offered hospital beds at too early a stage in the recovery process poat-tsunami, a time when they would have been of greater hindrance rather than help. The donor was therefore asked whether they could be re-directed elsewhere and they ended up being re-located in Eastern Europe, a far more appropriate use for them.
- Instead of in-kind provision competing with the economy, it can be used to enhance it. In Serbia, for example, industrial sewing machines were strategically placed among refugees who had been aid-dependent in the wake of decades of ethnic cleansing. The provision served as a capital injection in their community, enabling micro-enterprise projects to provide independence for the participants.