February 8, 2012

The Japan NGO Earthquake Relief & Recovery Fund is now concentrating on the recovery phase of its efforts. One of the first recipients of funding in this stage was the Sanaburi Foundation. The following is a thank-you note from the foundation.

To the supporters of the JCIE fund:

I would like to express my deepest gratitude for your funding of the Sanaburi Foundation, the Tohoku region’s only community foundation. Our goal is to serve as a “resource” for those who seek to bring about social change in the region and those who are earnestly carrying out efforts to help the region recover from the recent disaster. We are taking a broad perspective in the search for solutions to the community’s problems, and at the same time we hope to play a go-between role to bring together resources within the community that have not yet been utilized, people that have not yet met, and information and media that have not yet been shared. As we provide funding to others to conduct projects in the region, we intend to gather information on the various innovations and successful (or unsuccessful) cases. By sharing that information with the next people who are planning projects, we can contribute to the process of handing down knowledge that can raise the quality of the efforts being undertaken throughout the region.

In Japan, where the concept of the community foundation is not yet widely known, this type of institution-building support can provide a major boost to the growth of an organization. By strengthening this support function within the community, we can speed up the support of regional recovery efforts and leverage the existing funds. Thank you once again to all of those who contributed to this fund. I hope you will continue to support our efforts.

— Seiichi Ohtaki, Chair, Sanaburi Foundation