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The activities of the majority of foundations are distributed over country, regional, urban and or local levels. The activities of 17% of foundations reach beyond the country’s borders.
Over half of the foundations, mainly school and nursery school foundations, act in the field of education. There is also a considerable number, operate in the fields of culture and health. Foundations also operate in the fields of social security, human rights, environmental protection, development of civil society, law making, development of local communities, economy, etc. A great part of foundations carry out charitable activity.
Based upon the above trends, the majority of Georgian Foundations conduct educational activities for example, training seminars (32.1% on a regular basis, 28.6% occasionally). They also; research, analyze and disseminate information; conduct scientific research; lobby for specific laws, and monitor or conduct public or alternative (?) examinations.
Presumably, the range of activities conducted by the Georgian foundations of Georgia is determined by a number of factors, such as:
• The lack of such activities in Georgian everyday life and therefore in demand;
• These types of activity, are promoted by donor organizations;
• The country’s intellectual resources from diverse budgetary scientific and educational institutions have come together in the non-governmental sector, particularly within foundations
Only 43 foundations (17.1%) consider their activity to be successful and 75 (29.9%) – partly successful. Some 63 foundations (25%) only partly achieve their goals; the rest 70 foundations (27.9%) consider their activity to be either partly or, fully unsuccessful.
Obstacles in the Activities of Foundations
Generally, the most considerable obstacles indicated by the managers of foundations, is a poor financial state, other stated obstacles include:
• Means of communication;
• Information;
• Support of volunteers;
• Cooperation with other organizations;
• High or improper taxes;
• Difficulties of relationship with governmental bodies, etc.
The Financial State of Foundations
Generally, the most considerable sources of financing are local donations and property endowments of their members; grants and funds obtained from economic activity play a less important role.
Half of the questioned foundation managers have complained about unfavorable financial state. The burden is evident from evaluation foundations budgets, and in the opinion of 85% of the mangers questioned, 29% state their finances to be extremely bad, 32% unsatisfactory, and 24& unstable; whilst only 15% are satisfied and 1% very good.
As regards the property of foundations, which is comprised of finances and all type of values, it is also insignificant; 72% of foundations estimate the total of their property as lower than 5 000 GEL, only 9% of foundations have a property exceeding 25 000 GEL.
During 1999 and 2000, 40.5% and 32.2% respectively had no budget. Most frequently the annual budget comprised 500 to 5000 GEL (25.3% and 31.4% of foundations in 1999 and 2000 respectively). An average of 7% of foundations have an annual budget exceeding 250 000 GEL.
The relatively insignificant financial capacity of foundations is also indicated by the fact that, only 13.9 % (37 foundations) own offices; 16.9% (45 foundations) rent their offices on a regular basis. The rest of organizations rent offices occasionally; in some cases the staff work either at their main jobs or at home. Only 12 % of organizations have a nice office – equipment, furniture and other supplies.
Cooperation with the Government, Business Sector and Media
Cooperation with Local Councils represents the most frequent type or relationship with government. The attitude shown by the respondents with respect to Local Councils is clearly negative: 202 out of 268 foundations questioned consider it to be confronting. Only 56 foundations (20.9%) cooperate with this branch of the local government.
A much larger number of foundations cooperate with Local Administration and municipality (28.4% and 27.6% of foundations respectively). Cases of cooperation with the government and the Parliament are also frequent (29.5% and 26.1% respectively).
A total of 34 foundations (12.7%) have the experience of working jointly with the business sector.
The foundations have frequent and multi-colored contacts with the media. Most frequently the media reflect an activity or a certain action (36.2% of foundations), prepare programs about them (24.3%). Besides, a large number of foundations react upon this or that event by means of media.
Relationship with Donors
Some 14% of organizations have their main donor; 42.1% have a single donor, 41 foundations (17.6%) have never had contacts with donor organizations.
The managers of seventy-two (26.9%) foundations questioned mentioned problems in the relationship with donors. The unawareness of projects evaluation criteria was mentioned as the most acute of problems. It should be pointed out that the priorities of donors often do not match the real situation existing in one single field or the goals of an organization fixed in its charter. The policy, strategy and priorities of donors are often vague and general. In addition, donors do not award grants for organizational development.
In order to overcome the above-mentioned problems it is desirable that donors:
• Clearly determine the criteria of evaluation of definite grant programs and make contest participants aware of those;
• Learn the real situation existing in a contest field prior to the announcement of contest and determine the priorities on this basis
As particularly valuable among means to overcome the difficulties of contacts with donors the leaders of foundations mentioned: consultations on the subject of donor search, study of foreign experience of working with donors, study of reference materials concerning foundations, information management and training on the development of skills required for the search of funds.
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