About a year ago, when Zhang Yanli, president of the Beijing
Charity Association (BCA), saw the 2004 financial report of her
organization, she felt anxiety.
Donations the BCA received amounted to about 23 million yuan
(US$2.9 million). Although there was a growth from prior years, a
comparison with some big city associations - such as the Shanghai
Charity Foundation (SCF), which received 240 million yuan (US$30
billion) in 2004 - dwarfed those of the capital's major charity
organization.
For the nearly 200,000 people who rely on government relief and
cannot afford decent schooling and health care, the money was far
from enough.
After contemplation, Zhang and her colleagues decided to promote
harder. And to do that, they needed to work more closely with the
media.
But the association managed to find a powerful partner - the
Beijing Evening News, one of the largest circulation local
newspapers. They designed a project to solicit donations of
artworks from artists living in Beijing for a charity auction, with
the Beijing Evening News agreeing to devote dozens of free pages
for advertising and promotion.
The revenue will be used for the BCA's current aid schemes,
including health assistance for 28,000 relief-taking senior
citizens, an annual 1,000-yuan (US$123) subsidy for each of 1,000
poor high school students, and 1,000 wheelchairs for the city's
disabled every year.
"The media play an important role in charity," Zhang said. "On
the one hand they help discover cases where charity is needed, and
on the other hand they can arouse the public's charity
awareness."
The involvement of the Beijing Evening News generated
telling clout that tallied with Zhang's assumption. Since July 15,
the first day the newspaper launched a full page promoting the
charity project, the project's donation hotline has been busy
answering enquiries.
More than 2,000 calls were recorded in the first two months
since then. Although the project was targeted at generous artists,
ordinary residents also responded.
"One day a man called in, saying: 'I'm not an artist, but I want
to donate some artworks from my collections,'" said Wang Haiping,
art director of the Beijing Yanbodu Gallery, who was hired to
oversee the collection of donations.
"That was really touching." Despite the tough heat in the
summer, there were so many people visiting the office every day -
many of them elder artists and some in families, and some artists
even donated twice, said Wang.
By the end of last November, the BCA had received more than 500
artworks, including calligraphy, paintings, seal cuttings,
sculptures and chinaware. The donors are mainly big-name artists in
the capital, including Han Meilin, designer of the mascot of 2008
Beijing Olympics.
The donations were exhibited in Beijing last December and moved
to Tianjin, Hangzhou and some cities in Guangdong and Shandong
provinces. The BCA plans to auction a first batch before the Spring
Festival, according to Cheng Liyan, the BCA's deputy
secretary-general.
Cheng declined to predict the gains from the auction but was
optimistic about the outcome.
"Owing to the works of these leading artists, the value of the
donations is obvious," she said. "Considering the charity theme of
the auction, the outcome will be more than a normal auction can
yield."
The BCA planned to use 30 percent of the auctioned money to
cover the project's operational costs and the rest for its charity
schemes, according to Cheng.
She attributed the imminent success to the partnership with the
Beijing Evening News.
"The media can reach many more people than we do," she said.
"They let more people know who are in need of help, what we are
doing, and how we are going to use their money."
BCA has not finished its financial report of 2005 yet, but Cheng
was confident the revenue will be higher than the 2004 level.
Despite the exciting performance in the media-backed charity
experiment, the BCA remains cool-minded about the tough journey
ahead.
Challenges in the growth of the BCA and the charity industry as
a whole include inadequate public awareness, a general mistrust of
charitable organizations and restrictive government regulations in
some ways, said Zhang, BCA president.
"I've been to Hong Kong and Macao, and I saw so many charitable
organizations there, taking care of various welfare institutions as
well as numerous donation activities held regularly for public
participation," Zhang said. "Charity awareness is ingrained in
their minds from childhood.
"It takes long-term efforts to elevate the public awareness (on
the mainland) to that level."
The BCA has made it a priority in the near future to build up
the "brand image" of its key projects, such as an education aid
programme named "Your Love, Their Future," one for the disabled
named "Help the Amputees Stand Up," and "Refueling Life," a project
that helps congenital heart disease patients.
It is going to strengthen its promotion through co-operation
with the media to make these projects, as well as the charitable
missions, accepted by more people, Zhang said.
"Charity is not only the responsibility of the rich but also
something related to everybody," she said and then borrowed an old
Chinese saying: "Only when everyone contributes firewood can the
flames run high."
(China Daily January 25, 2006)