Anastasia Tsvetkova, CEO at the Lake Baikal Foundation, made a speech at the roundtable «Charity tomorrow: trends that change the social sphere», which was held in the framework of the Russian Investment Forum in Sochi.
The purpose of the round table was to discuss trends in modern charity, practices in the work of NPOs and business, innovative technologies that help transform the social assistance system, as well as examples of social, cultural and environmental projects.
The non-profit sector was represented by such speakers as: Oksana Oracheva, CEO at the Vladimir Potanin Foundation, Anna Federmesser, the Founder of the Hospice Charity fund «Vera», Elizaveta Oleskina, the Director of the «Starost v radost» Charity Foundation, Fatima Mukhomejan, the Deputy Director of the «Art, Science and Sport», Dmitry Tomchuk, Executive Director of «Peri» Charitable Foundation, Anna Soshinskaya, President of the «Amway for Future» Foundation, as well as Alena Kuratova, President of the «Deti-bela» Charitable Foundation and Maxim Tokarev, Director of the NPO «Center for Development of environmental and social projects», member of the Public Council at «Lake Baikal» Foundation.
During her speech, Anastasia noted the following trends in the development of charity in Russia:
- the growth of private donations from the middle class;
- the development of regional charitable organizations and private fundraising funds;
- development of intellectual volunteering, especially in the legal and financial sectors;
- expansion of the charitable assistance directions – we can observe growth of civil self-consciousness and the society’s readiness to solve not only urgent issues, but also issues related to future generations ones, for example, ecology;
- development of cooperation quality between NPOs and business.
In the speech, a number of tasks which require solution were also sounded:
- improvement of professionalism in the third sector;
- overcoming a model when NPOs are compelled to act as a petitioner for business, rather than a partner in strengthening the social mission of companies;
- increase transparency in the activities of the third sector;
- starting a regular dialogue with the society in an understandable language focused on results and achievements.
Anastasia talked about a number of successful initiatives of the Lake Baikal Foundation, raising public awareness of environmental issues. In this perspective, CEO noted the project «Baikal Initiative» and cited an example of the crowdbanding campaign effectiveness implemented by a team of young scientists led by A. Povarintsev with the purpose of raising funds for the project implementation named «Monitoring of water birds in the south of Lake Baikal in conditions of prolonged low water availability». She also touched on the topic of environmental education. And she cited the project-winner of the presidential «With a backpack on the trail», which will be implemented in June 2018. This project is aimed at stimulating education of a careful attitude to nature from childhood.
Regarding the dialogue with colleagues – Anastasia Tsvetkova told about the experience exchange with specialized funds in other countries. This communication allows expanding the expertise of the Lake Baikal Foundation in the development of environmental programs involving non-profit organizations.