The International Association for Volunteer Effort (IAVE)

The International Association for Volunteer Effort

General Information
Conference Participation
Featured Online
 

The International Association for Volunteer Effort (IAVE) is the only international organization with the mission to promote, celebrate, and strengthen volunteerism worldwide. It was created in 1970 by a small group of people from throughout the world who shared a common vision of how volunteers can contribute:

• To the solution of human and social problems, and
• To the development of bridges of understanding among people of all nations.

They recognized the importance of international exchange of information, best practices and mutual support as a way of encouraging and strengthening volunteering globally. 

Since 1970, IAVE has held world volunteer conferences every other year. These conferences have been the primary global convening of leaders of volunteering from throughout the world. The most recent was the 22nd IAVE World Volunteer Conference, which was held in London in December 2012. The next world conference is scheduled to be held in Gold Coast, Australia in September 2014.

IAVE also holds regional conferences in different regions of the world in alternate (odd) years. The First IAVE Regional Volunteer Conference for the Arab Nations was held in Beirut in March 2011. One offshoot of that event was the establishment of Shamaa, an organization founded by youth to promote youth volunteering in the region. The second regional conference is being planned now - to take place in Oman in November or December 2013.

Dr. Patricia Nabti, the Director of the Learning to CARE Institute, is the Regional Representative of IAVE for the Arab Nations. For a current list of National Representatives from Arab countries please click here.

Individuals and organizations that want to actively promote volunteering in the region are encouraged to become members of IAVE. For more information about IAVE, visit the IAVE website: www.iave.org.  For updates about IAVE conferences and news about volunteering in the Arab region be sure to sign up for the Institute newsletter in Arabic or English.

Arab Regional Participation
at the 22nd IAVE World Volunteer Conference
London, December 10-12, 2012
Leading Tomorrow’s Global Volunteer Community – Together
 

Over 400 people attended the conference from 70 countries worldwide. They included 23 participants from 10 Arab countries:  6 from Saudi Arabia, 5 from Kuwait, 2 each from Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, and Tunisia, and one each from Jordan, Morocco, Palestine, and the UAE. We were 25 if we count the woman from Colombia of Lebanese heritage, Raaida Mannaa, who we adopted into our delegation and the representative of UPS on the Global Corporate Volunteer Council (Ed Martinez)  whose mother is Lebanese.

The participants from the region included 5 IAVE National Representatives (Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, and Qatar  + the UAE), four representatives of national volunteer centers (Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE), and five representatives of corporate volunteering (Hikma Pharmaceuticals in Jordan, National Commercial Bank in Saudi Arabia, and  3 from HP in Morocco and Tunisia. There would have been five more participants from a total of 13 countries, but two people from Kuwait who registered did not attend, and the three National Representatives from Algeria, Sudan, and Yemen could not get visas in time. Moussa, Osama, and Hasan – we really missed you! Four of the participants gave presentations: Ismail Abu Arafeh from Palestine, Dr. Salem Aldini from KSA, Ahmed Almershed from Kuwait, and Dr. Patricia Nabti, Director of the Learning to CARE Institute, from Lebanon.

All in all, we had a great opportunity to network among ourselves and meet people committed to promoting volunteering from around the world.

Featured Online

Check out the report in Arabic from the Sanaya Club youth participants of Kuwait and over 1500 pictures of the conference on the IAVE website: https://www.facebook.com/iavenews?fref=ts.