On July 31, 2015, after 53 years of working with families in developing countries, the Canadian Hunger Foundation (CHF) ceased operations.  CHF distinguished itself for helping families produce food in a sustainable manner and raising family incomes out of poverty. CHF’s President Stewart Hardacre said “While we were reaching more people than ever, we weren’t investing what other charities were on marketing to donors …. ultimately we couldn’t keep pace with our fundraising needs.” CHF’s remaining projects are transitioning to World University Service of Canada and Canadian Feed the Children to ensure their completion.

Founded in 1961, CHF (formerly Canadian Hunger Foundation) is dedicated to enabling poor rural communities in developing countries attain sustainable livelihoods. Spanning its history, CHF has worked with local development partners in 51 countries.  In F2011 it was engaged with 6 African, 5 Asian, and 1 South American country, while dividing its focus on Agricultural programs (80%), Training / Education programs (15%), and Infrastructure development (5%).

CHF identifies the key to creating its effective and enduring development programs is the holistic process that integrates input from local government, NGO partners and the affected communities. It first analyzes untapped community assets, then develops livelihood strategies that are economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable in existing or new markets.  CHF also emphasizes self-sufficiency, and provides capacity building for local organizations during program implementation.

Through its sustained efforts over the years, CHF reported improving harvests for South Sudanese farmers by as much as 60%, providing 10,500 households in Bangladesh with small business seed financing, and increasing income by 20% for 771 Guyanese farmers.

In F2011, administrative costs were 2% of revenues, while fundraising costs were 13% of donations.  CHF had $12.3m in funding reserves (including 0.1% donor-endowed funds of $15k), which would cover program costs 1.1 times.  CHF received $1.6m of other income from “Recovery of operational expenses”.