CARE is Changing

At the beginning of 2008, CARE Afghanistan completed its Long Range Strategic Plan (LRSP) for the next five years. The new five year plan will bring some changes to the Country Office as we know it.

There will be an increased focus on establishing partnerships with local organizations. Partnerships with local actors are part of an approach to ensure more sustainable solutions. Building the skills of Afghan organizations will strengthen the national civil society and remain independently from the presence of big international organizations.

Another change will be the shift from a project to programme approach. To ensure greater impact, CARE is moving towards a more holistic approach way to do programming. Instead of having sector divided programmes, as we currently do, the organization will move towards a more integrated approach where parts of our current programmes will linked together to form a joint program targeting a specific target group.

The target groups that will be the focus of CAREs work between 2009 and 2013 will be :

1. The most socially and economically marginalized women
2. Returnees and IDPs
3. The most vulnerable and marginalized population of rural areas
4. The most vulnerable and marginalized population in communities prone to disasters and environmental change
5. Disaster affected people in secure and insecure areas

Strategic Plan

Many of you might be wondering what strategic planning is about and why it’s so important to CARE Afghanistan. We put a lot of thought and energy into strategic planning as it helps us understand what our aims are. This helps us to better make decisions about what work to do and helps us better communicate who we are with our staff, the community and with donors. Having a good strategic plans means that we also consciously work to these goals rather than just doing what other people want us to do. It also helps us focus on making a real impact in the communities we work rather than just implementing a project, finishing the activities and not thinking about the future.

In this edition of Care at a Glance, you will see a summary of our strategic plan. We share the same vision as the rest of CARE International but everything else is specific to CARE Afghanistan.

You will see that our mission statement explains what we see as our role in Afghanistan and shows what we see are the important issues for us. The Goal explains where we want to be as an organization at the end of the five year period for which this strategic plan was written. The focus is very much on working with poor, marginalized and vulnerable people; and also the promotion of Gender, Equity and Diversity. Its also important to us that we have real impact by focusing on the real reasons for poverty rather than just finishing projects.

We have been very ambitious for the next five years. We want to see CARE Afghanistan transform and change to stay relevant and become more focused. This is only an introduction to the plan as there is not enough space here to explain all the details. The full strategic plan is currently being translated and will be made available to staff soon.

The major themes in this strategic plan are that we want to focus on Long term programs. You will read more about this in another article. We also want to move towards a partnership approach where we work closer with local organizations and in partnership with key stakeholders rather than directly implementing all projects. We want to become more focused on learning so that we increase our staff capacity and are better able to be an innovative organization. Part of this is also a focus on Gender, Equity and Diversity so that we are both more inclusive as an organization and more responsive to the needs of all.

A very important part of the strategic plan is also being clear about the values and principles of the organization and you will see that we are very clear and upfront about these. It’s important for all staff to understand and know what they can about the strategic plan. We hope that you find this strategic plan useful and encourage you to share any questions you have with us. Every time we make decisions about what to do in the head office, we do so with this plan in our minds. We are committed to our part in improving the situation for poor, marginalize and vulnerable Afghans and think this plan puts us on the right track for doing so.

The strategic plan is just the first step. There is so much more work to do to make it a reality but knowing where we want to be helps us to make sure we actually get there!