1945–1949: Origins and the CARE Package CARE, then the Cooperative for American Remittances to Europe, was formally founded on November 27, 1945, and was originally intended to be a temporary organization. Churches, welfare organisations and trade unions were among the 22 founding members.
World War II had ended in August of the same year. After pressure from the public and Congress, President Harry S. Truman agreed to let private organizations provide relief for those starving due to the war. CARE was initially a consortium of twenty-two U.S. charities (a mixture of
civic, religious,
cooperative, farm, and
labour organizations) to deliver food
aid to
Europe in the
aftermath of World War II. but then
William N. Haskell served as executive director from late 1945 until 1947. In February 1946, William N. Haskell wrote to Oskar Lange, the Polish ambassador in Washington, explaining the plan and asking for his assistance in obtaining Polish government's consent to its extension to Poland. The organization delivered its first food packages in 1946. CARE's food aid took the form of
CARE Packages, which were at first delivered to specific individuals: the US people paid $10 to send a CARE Package of food to a loved one in Europe, often a family member. President Truman bought the first CARE package. Although the organization had originally intended to deliver packages only to specified individuals, within a year CARE began delivering packages addressed for example "to a teacher" or simply "to a hungry person in Europe". Twenty-two of CARE's forty-two missions were closed, mostly in European countries, and efforts were concentrated on food distribution and emergency response in the developing world. Over 100 million CARE Packages had been delivered worldwide since the first shipment to France. The concept was also revived in 2011 as an online campaign encouraging donors to fill a "virtual CARE Package" with food aid and services such as education and healthcare.
Microfinance In the early 1990s CARE also developed what would become an important model for cooperative
microfinance. This model is called the Village Savings and Loans Associations and it began in 1991 as a pilot project run by CARE's Country Office in
Niger. The model has also been widely replicated in
Africa and
Asia and by other large NGOs including
Oxfam,
Plan International, and
Catholic Relief Services. CARE UK later launched
lendwithcare.org, which allows members of the public to make
microloans, including green loans, to entrepreneurs in Africa and Asia. It avoids many of the criticisms levelled at
Kiva.org.
Acronym redefinition and 50th anniversary In 1993 CARE, to reflect its international organizational structure, changed the meaning of its acronym for a third time, adopting its current name the "Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere". CARE also marked its 50th anniversary in 1994. CARE expanded the confederation to twelve members in the early 2000s, with CARE Netherlands (formerly the Disaster Relief Agency) joining in 2001 and CARE Thailand (called the Raks Thai Foundation) joining in 2003, becoming the first CARE National Member in a developing country. CARE's well-known "I am Powerful" campaign launched in the US in September 2006 and was intended to bring public attention to the organization's long-standing focus on
women's empowerment. CARE states that its programs focus on women and girls both because the world's poor are
disproportionately female and because women's empowerment is thought to be an important driver of development. CARE also emphasizes that it considers working with boys and men an important part of women's empowerment, and that women's empowerment benefits both genders. In 2007 CARE announced that by 2009 it would no longer accept certain types of US food aid worth some $45 million a year, arguing that these types of food aid are inefficient and harmful to local markets. Specifically, CARE announced that it would forego all
monetized food aid (surplus US food shipped to charities in the developing world who then sell the food on the local market to finance development projects) and all food aid intended to establish a commercial advantage for the donor, and would increase its commitment to buying food aid locally. CARE also announced that it would no longer accept
USDA food through
Title 1 (concessional sales) or Section 416 (surplus disposal) because these programs are intended mainly to establish a commercial advantage for US agriculture. In 2011 CARE added its first affiliate member, CARE India, and in 2012 the CI board accepted CARE Peru as CARE's second affiliate member. CARE India became a full member in November 2013. The CI board accepted CARE Peru as a full member of the confederation in June 2015. CARE is currently one of the only major NGOs to make their database of
project evaluations publicly available, and to regularly conduct a
meta-analysis of evaluation methodologies and overall organizational impact. == Structure ==