CADFA is the delivery agency for the international development organisation known as Redeemers Relief Agency International (RAIN) based in Oxford, United Kingdom. It has other operational bases in South Africa, Lesotho, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia and Ivory Coast. After carefully conducting needs assessment and consultation with partners internationally and locally in Nigeria, our operations in Nigeria are carried out as a `Second-tier` organisations or as an infrastructure organisation. We work with organisations that work directly with the beneficiaries to give them the support, information and resources that can assist them to deliver their services in a more effective way. Such organisations might be charities, civil society organisations, social enterprises or community based organisations. We refer to them as `frontline` organisations.
Our organisation is birthed after rigorous research in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, in order to understand how NGOs can deliver better services to their beneficiaries and become better professionalized with what they do. We are not set up to compete with local charities; but we exist to complement what they do and open better opportunities for them globally. Because we maintain our location in Africa as well as in the United Kingdom, we are better informed and resourced to leverage resources and expertise to accelerate the development of the sector in Africa. Within the short time that we have existed in Nigeria, we have been able to make a lot of strides. For instance, we carried out together with Niger Delta Environment and Relief Foundation (NIDEREF) the research that produced the report titled: Private Gain Public Disaster, Social Context of Illegal Oil Bunkering and Artisanal Refining in the Niger Delta. This is a very detailed study that took our study team to most of the communities in the three states of our focus, namely: Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta States.
As a result of that report, the Partnership and Collaboration Unit of SPDC employed CADFA services to help formulate a response to the problem of youth`s attraction to criminality in the Niger Delta which led to the design of the Alternative Livelihoods Project targeting the Youth, Women and Vulnerable people in the Niger Delta. Through our partnership brokerage skills and experience, CADFA was able to broker a robust partnership between them and another international development agency based in Nigeria.
Recently, CADFA carried out a study on Micro-Economic Study of Ogoniland. The result was released in September, 2014. We are part of the Community Energy Africa initiative to address Energy Poverty in Nigeria. We are assisting communities and organisations to develop energy generation projects that can serve the needs of their organisations and communities. CADFA was also recently engaged by the Post-Amnesty Oil and Gas Industry Foundation (OGIF) to carry out the Independent Evaluation of their Post-Amnesty Empowerment Programme with about 1,300 beneficiaries across the Niger Delta.
CADFA is a donor supporting organisation for the Nigerian Network of NGOs (NNNGOs) and it has started a mentoring programme for some of the organisations that are members of the network. CADFA is the only African member of Social Enterprise UK.
