Last year, 2016, was another big year for Candlelight. The organization has been expanding its grant-making to better address communities’ needs. This has been happening, at a time funds have been shrinking; at a time the non-profit sector in Somaliland has been experiencing hard times and major declining of humanitarian funding resources. At a time hundreds of thousands of Somaliland pastoral and agro pastoral communities have lost their livelihoods and hit with the most severe drought in the history of Somaliland. Yet, we are confident that Candlelight’s activities will continue reaching out and have positively impact thousands of community members in all parts of the country who are in need of immediate support.
The programs of the organization have been devoted to respond to the most critical challenges of
Somaliland communities by stressing resilience building vs, enhancing local productivity to increase food security, provision of quality formal and technical education for youth as well as literacy and numeracy for men/women, livelihood support grants by training entrepreneurs and investing in small businesse scales to boost local economic circulations, responding to humanitarian emergency situations, introducing climate change adaptation techniques, addressing environmental degradation, and standing against gender based violence.
I am very much sure that Candlelight will grow into new heights in future to continue responding to
community challenges and work towards the realization of its mission.
Finally, I would like to give my sincere thanks to the members of the Board, their judgment and dedication for doing what is right for the organization is unparalleled. I would also appreciate the energy, commitment and enthusiasm of the Staff and their leadership, and lastly not the least our development partners for their various contributions for enabling us to reach our target beneficiaries.
Ahmed Ibrahim Awale
Chairman Board of Directors
