About CORE

CORE aims to help by investing in people.

Founded in 2005, CORE International is based in Canmore, Alberta but works with local organizations in Nepal (and eventually other countries) to help people who usually do not benefit from conventional aid projects.

CORE's beneficiaries include some of the most disadvantaged people in Nepal – widows, who are severely discriminated against, and the rural poor who have either migrated to urban areas for employment or who work as porters to earn wages to feed their families.

Vision

A world of hope, tolerance, opportunity, and social justice; where all people live with dignity and security.

Mission Statement

CORE International’s mission is to serve people in poor communities who have been excluded from conventional philanthropic or development assistance. To help them create opportunities to improve their quality of life through innovative solutions, advocating global responsibility, and working to facilitate lasting change that is guided by the needs and aspirations of the community.

CORE International will work as a partner with the many other organisations within the worldwide movement dedicated to ending poverty.
 

Goals

• Strives to enable people and communities who are socio-economically disadvantaged to progress towards community self-reliance, improved livelihoods, and a better quality of life.

• Aims to encourage discussion on development issues to increase general awareness of the enormous discrepancies between the rich and the poor people and nations.

• Focuses on the people who have been missed – the rural and urban disadvantaged.

• Provides support in the form of funds, skilled trainers (or support to hire trainers), and facilitators for local groups to organize training and resources to improve literacy, education, vocational or technical skills (health worker training, etc), to open opportunities to improve livelihoods and help communities.
   

Guiding Principles

• Aims to enable people to have the skills and access to resources (revolving funds, savings-&-credit, and training) to help themselves.

• Reaches people who are poor and/or marginalized as the primary beneficiaries by supporting community groups with funds for training and facilitators for literacy groups and microfinance.

• Supports work among groups of people and in geographical regions where international aid organizations have not provided assistance in a particular sector or issue.

• Works to enable local organizations with training, mentoring, and funds to carry out small projects that enable people to have the skills and/or resources to help themselves.

• Provides training, funds, and mentoring to community organizations at the village level to carry out small initiatives that will generate local ownership.

• Matches the needs of our beneficiaries with other other services available in the communities and districts by referring our local partner organizations to other projects and organisations that can provide:

• cost and time-saving appropriate technology that improves the livelihoods of our beneficiary individuals and communities.  For instance, a woman can save five-hours a day by not having to collect firewood if she can get a small biogas producing chamber that produces methane gas for cooking.

• expertise in building skills in a particular sector – education, health, etc.

• Contributes to the preservation of local traditions, diversity, and indigenous knowledge that promote the well-being of the community and individuals, for instance, by providing funds for a school that teaches traditional herbal medicine.  However, we will provide funds for awareness raising/education to help minimize practices that might harm, physically or mentally, individuals or groups of people. 

• Acknowledges that real progress is a long-term process that requires commitments to communities and partners.

• Contributes to addressing problems of urban migration at both the rural origins and the urban destination of the migrants.

• Creates opportunities for women, minorities, and disenfranchised people in both the selection of projects and, when applicable, the hiring of individuals.