About AdaraWe believe that each and every person should have access to quality health,

education and other essential services, no

matter where they live

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The history of the Adara Group

The Adara Group was founded in 1998 by Audette Exel to bridge the worlds of business and

international development with a special focus on serving the most vulnerable communities.

Today the group comprises two different parts, an international development organization called

Adara Development and two corporate advisory businesses - Adara Advisors Pty Limited and

Adara Partners (Australia) Pty Limited. The sole objective of the businesses is to help support

Adara Development’s administrative costs. This allows 100% of all other donations received

by Adara Development to go directly to project-related costs.

Since 1998, the Adara businesses have donated over $US12 million to Adara Development for

administration, infrastructure and emergency project costs, with a further $US24 million

contributed by donors and partners for direct project work on the ground.

Adara has a 22-year track record in complex service delivery in remote and disadvantaged

communities with a focus on health and education. Over this time, we have become experts

in maternal, newborn and child health and remote community development. Each year,

we reach more than 50,000 people through service delivery and countless others through

knowledge sharing. Our depth of service and knowledge allows us to scale and have breadth at

a much greater level.

Adara is a registered charity in Australia, USA, Bermuda, UK, Nepal and Uganda.

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• We thrive on innovation. Our business for purpose model allows us to work in ways

others can’t. 100% of any donations received will directly support children and communities

in need. The Adara businesses are ‘for purpose’ rather than for profit. Their sole objective is

to fund Adara Development’s administration and emergency project costs.

• We say yes when others say no. We do what others won’t - like deliver specialised

newborn care in East Africa, or reach extremely remote, isolated communities in the

Himalayas where few government services reach. We are unconventional and not afraid to

be different.

• We are transparent. We scrutinise and monitor our work, to ensure every dollar is

accounted for, and is creating the biggest impact possible. This means we can provide

highly detailed and transparent reports to our donor partners.

• We are in it for the long haul, both with our donor partners and the communities we work

with. We will not leave a community until the need is addressed and the job is done.

• We believe in respect, integrity and humility. We share our knowledge honestly – our

mistakes as well as our successes.

• We resource and support local excellence. We hire brilliant local staff, not foreign staff,

and train and upskill local people.

Why Adara is different

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Why maternal, newborn child health?

Preventing maternal and newborn deaths

Despite recent gains made in reducing maternal and infant mortality across the globe, rates in low-

resource settings are still unacceptably high. In particular, Uganda is not on track to achieve the

Sustainable Development Goals for maternal and newborn mortality by 2030.

The overarching aim of the Adara’s Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (MNCH) work is to reduce

preventable maternal, newborn and child deaths and improve the health and wellbeing of

communities in low-resource settings.

Our work is in line with the Sustainable Development Goal 3: Good Health and

Wellbeing, with a focus on target 3.2: ending the preventable deaths of

newborns and children under 5 years of age by 2030.

In Uganda we specialise in delivering high-quality healthcare to women,

newborns and children at health facilities, in the community and at

home. We have worked in this space since 1999, developing deep

expertise and implementing significant projects that contribute to the

wellbeing of mothers and their children.

We have carried out much of this work in partnership with Kiwoko

Hospital, a 200-plus-bed non-profit hospital occupying a 30 acre

site in the Nakaseke district of Central Uganda. It acts as a referral

hospital for a catchment area of one million people.

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Adara’s holistic approach to MNCH

1) Centre of excellenceWith our partner, Kiwoko Hospital, we have demonstrated the impact of an integrated model of care that

encompasses training, clinical support and high standard facility and community based care. The Kiwoko

Hospital NICU is considered a centre of excellence in neonatal health in Uganda.

2) Building capacity in newborn health servicesAdara has ambitious scale up plans for the future and is looking to work with the Ugandan Ministry of Health

to develop newborn care units around the country. We have written guidelines of care and a nursing

curriculum, and we are piloting a newborn training programme at Nakaseke government Hospital.

3) Safe Bubble CPAP (non-invasive ventilation strategy for newborns)In low-resource settings, newborn resuscitation is incredibly difficult. Adara is partnering with PATH, the

University of Washington, Seattle Children’s Hospital and Kiwoko Hospital to develop a Safe Bubble CPAP

kit, specially designed to treat babies suffering with Respiratory Distress Syndrome (a leading cause of

death for premature babies) in low-resource settings where there is no consistent power supply.

4) Early intervention for high-risk newbornsAdara has partnered with the London School of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene to trial a world-first early-

intervention programme in central Uganda to ensure better quality of life for families and children at risk of

disability.

5) Knowledge sharingWe share our knowledge and expertise on a global stage to help touch more lives. Adara is a member of

The National Newborn Steering Committee in Uganda, committed to increasing newborn survival. We are

members of the Every Woman Every Child movement. We regularly present on a global stage about our

MNCH work.

Newborn survivalSurvival for low birth weight newborns (weighing less than 2.5kg) has increased from

61% to 88% in the Kiwoko Hospital NICU between 2005 and 2019.

Our Impact

Safer deliveriesWe have seen a 48% increase in admissions to Kiwoko’s maternity ward since the new

ward opened in 2010. This means more women are giving birth at a facility in the

Nakaseke region, which increases chance of survival for both mother and baby.

Better follow-up care

In the communities we work with, we have seen a huge shift in the understanding of

the importance of follow-up care. There has been a 31% increase in antenatal

appointments at Kiwoko Hospital since 2012. And since Adara launched a new

Hospital to Home discharge and follow up process, hundreds more newborns and

mothers are receiving direct follow-up care at home.

Health prevention

Thanks to Adara and Kiwoko Hospital’s community-based safe motherhood clinics,

more than 57,000 immunisations have been delivered to children since 2012.

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Why remote community development

Across the developing world, rural and remote communities face extreme challenges in terms of health and education coverage and access. An estimated 3 billion people – around 40 per cent of the

global population – live in the rural areas of developing countries. Despite the decrease in global poverty since 1990, a person’s place of residence still largely determines their access to health and education. That’s why Adara focuses on reaching at-risk children in some of the most remote, rural

areas in the world.

263 millionchildren worldwide don’t attend school each year

victims of human trafficking are children, worldwide, and this

figure is increasing

1 in 3

Of girls aged 15-24 in Humla are literate, compared with 80% in

Nepal overall.

Only 41.7%children in Nepal don’t attend

primary school each year

81,526

of children under 5 in Nepal are underweight, compared with a

global figure of 13.93%

27%

Probability of Nepali children under the age of five dying: 34 in

1000 live births.

Deaths under 5

Reaching isolated children in Nepal

Adara works in some of the most remote regions of Nepal. This includes the Humla district of

Northwest Nepal. Here there are villages that have never been connected by road and that are so

high up in the Himalayas that they are snowed in for months every winter. The remoteness of the

region creates huge challenges for its 60,000 people. Humla has low literacy rates, higher than

average maternal and infant mortality rates and experiences food shortages every winter.

We also work in Ghyangfedi, which is located 90km north of Kathmandu in Nuwakot. When the 2015

Nepal Earthquake hit, it was one of the worst hit areas. 100% of all buildings and homes were

impacted and all 9 schools were destroyed. 80 people lost their lives. Ghyangfedi is also known as

the epicentre of child trafficking in Nepal and when we first started to work in the area, there were

few girls remaining above the age of 10.

We know that children living in remote, isolated areas like Humla and Ghyangfedi are some of the

most at-risk in the world. And that’s why we’ve chosen to go where many other organisations have

not. To reach the most vulnerable.

Through this work we have become experts in Remote Community Development (RCD).

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Improving education and health

Adara has a holistic and collaborative approach to improving access to and quality of

education and health services throughout Nepal. All of our work is led by a local Nepali

team, and done in partnership with the community and local organisations.

EducationWe partner with 16 local schools

throughout Nepal, improving

education by:

• Maintaining and developing model

schools in Yalbang (Humla) and

Ghyangfedi

• Improving classrooms by providing

essential learning materials and

making facilities more child friendly

• Training teachers and supporting their

salaries

• Running before and after school care

classes, extra curricular activities and

providing child club training

• Supporting particularly vulnerable

students with scholarships

• Increasing parent engagement

• Supporting youth with vocational and

tertiary education

• Promoting child rights

HealthWe work to improve the prevention

and treatment of health issues

throughout Nepal by:

• Improving health post facilities,

training health post staff and

ensuring regular access to adequate

medicines and supplies

• Working with a Tibetan Medical

Practitioner who treats people in

extremely remote villages

• Providing emergency support

• Working with local health partners to

provide free medical care to poor

Nepalis

• Improving nutrition through

greenhouse installation and training

• Improving hygiene and sanitation

through training and innovative

solutions like smokeless stoves

• Running health awareness sessions

Our impact at a glance

1590 Children are currently enrolled in

Adara-supported schools across

Nepal.

In 2017, the Yalbang School was

named the best performing

remote community school by the

Government of Nepal, out of

30,000 government schools and

7,000 private schools.

Best school

52.4%of students in all Adara-

supported schools across

Nepal are girls.

3,7353,735 patients teated at the

five Adara-supported

government health clinics

(known as health posts) in

Humla in 2018.

Patients treated each year through

the free health clinics run by our

Partner, the Himalayan Medical

Foundation, in Kathmandu

10,000

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Overcoming the challenges of Covid-19 -Plans for 2020 and 2021

In these uncertain and unprecedented times, more than ever we need to

unite and reach out to our vulnerable neighbours across the globe.

Communities around the world are suffering, and this pandemic has exposed them to massive

disruption to their healthcare, education, access to basic needs and services like food,

protection and social interaction.

Crises like these tend to worsen existing inequalities, and we know from previous epidemics

that children and families – particularly the most deprived and marginalised – will be impacted

for months and years to come.

In light of the Covid-19 crisis, our work for the remainder of 2020 will focus on preparedness

and prevention. We have finalised our 2020 plans, although these will remain flexible as the

situation continually changes on the ground, and we are also managing and updating risk

matrices daily. The structures and tools we have developed over the last two decades of long-

term community development work will be incredibly useful as we respond to this pandemic and

deal with the long term social and economic repercussions.

Health and education services to the world’s most vulnerable people are, and will

continue to be, absolutely critical. We are in desperate need of support to ensure that

these essential services continue to be delivered in Uganda and Nepal.

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Revised strategic goals for 2020

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Key high level programme objectives

Health services

• Provide training and raise awareness of COVID-19

signs, symptoms, and methods of prevention among

health workers and the wider community.

• Protect health workers and support communities and

health facilities with necessary goods and supplies for

addressing COVID-19.

• Maintain continuity of essential health services in the

community. In Uganda this includes maternity services,

neonatal intensive care unit, HIV/AIDS support,

community outreach, immunisation and family planning.

Education and social protection

• Provide educational and social support to children and

youth whose education has been disrupted in Nepal.

• Ensure children are safe from abuse and prevent child

trafficking.

• Support nutrition education and relief for clients in

extreme need and take appropriate action to mitigate

food crisis.

• Provide Adara staff and community beneficiaries with

psychosocial support to overcome traumatic

experiences of Covid-19.

Ensure ongoing operations

• Monitor and maintain supply chains for essential goods

and services, including food.

• Coordinate and collaborate with government.

• Support our local partner organisation to maintain their

services and provide supplemental or alternative service

delivery.

2021 plans

We are hoping 2021 will be a year of recovery as we

rebuild and resume our planned programme work.

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Training in Humla, Nepal

Children in Ghyangfedi at

a hand washing station

Handwashing station at Kiwoko Hospital,

Uganda

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Further information

We would appreciate any support you are able

to give to ensure these critical health and

education services can be delivered.

For more information or questions, please contact

Rebecca Poyntz

Senior Partnerships Manager

Rebecca.poyntz@adaragroup.org

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APPENDIX

MNCH Video: Our tiniest clients

Remote Community Development Video: The Shree Ghyangfedi School

Operations Report 2018

NB: Click on image for access to Adara’s Operations Report 2018.

Adara’s Operations Report 2019 is being finalised and will be available in June.