World Con­cern human­i­tar­i­ans enjoy a cup of tea on the way to visit projects in Bangladesh. On the left is Prodip Dowa, who leads the team in Bangladesh; on the right is Rick Johan­nessen, who over­sees oper­a­tions across Asia.

What do you like with your cof­fee? Maybe a bagel? How about a goat instead!

This month, a Seat­tle cof­fee shop called the Q Cafe is donat­ing 10% of all pro­ceeds to World Con­cern. The chief barista, a pas­tor and friend of mine, esti­mates it will bring in about $350 that we can put toward human­i­tar­ian work. (Eugene Cho wrote about this today in his blog.)

You may think, “$350? That’s great, but it’s not a whole lot of money.” But that’s where you would be mis­taken. $350 can absolutely, pos­i­tively change the lives of many peo­ple, in some long-lasting trans­for­ma­tional ways.

Eugene the barista/pastor asked what $350 could do, and this was my e-mail reply:

Wow, Eugene!

That’s very kind. I appre­ci­ate you and the rest of the folks at the Q Cafe think­ing of World Con­cern — and it’s a plea­sure to fig­ure out how to spend the money!

When I was in Haiti, I saw the value of goats, which pro­vide incomes through the sale of kids. Some peo­ple also sell goat milk. Often, hav­ing a goat means chil­dren in a fam­ily can attend school.

After a series of hur­ri­canes last year, peo­ple were left with noth­ing of value. The storm killed their live­stock. I met grand­moth­ers and chil­dren who were pos­i­tively ecsta­tic to receive goats, to begin to build their herd once again.

So let’s buy a goat, with vac­ci­na­tions and a pen, for $70.

When I was in Bangladesh, I met sev­eral fish farm­ers. One stands out in my mind. He went from being a pedal-taxi dri­ver to a small busi­ness­man, once he began a busi­ness to farm-raise fish in a pond. It has allowed him to buy land, build a home, and send his lit­tle girls to school. He rises early each morn­ing and works hard — and with an oppor­tu­nity from World Con­cern — it has paid off.

Let’s buy some fish fin­ger­lings. A set of 2,000 fin­ger­lings costs about $40. We can pur­chase 4 sets for $160.

Also in Bangladesh, and in many other coun­tries, I was par­tic­u­larly sad­dened by the plight of women. It’s a tough place to live on a good day. But many men in Bangladesh (and else­where) treat women as second-class cit­i­zens. Women have so many respon­si­bil­i­ties, from rais­ing chil­dren, to farm­ing and rais­ing live­stock, to keep­ing a home. Many also have to earn any income her fam­ily may need, because the hus­band doesn’t feel like work­ing, or because she has been divorced. (And it’s easy to do in that cul­ture. Say “I divorce you” three times.) On top of that, if a woman wants to start a small busi­ness, she is often at the mercy of loan sharks. She didn’t have an oppor­tu­nity to get an edu­ca­tion when she was young, so she may fall prey to some­one who can see her vulnerabilities.

Let’s pro­vide train­ing and busi­ness equip­ment for one woman, so she can start her own busi­ness. It’s $125.

All of this adds up to $355. We can adjust it once we fig­ure out how much was raised.

I am get­ting all of these prices from World Concern’s Global Gift Guide. Flip­ping through it, I rec­og­nize many of the items for sale as real pro­grams that really do make an enor­mous dif­fer­ence in the life of the poor.

Let’s pray for good cof­fee sales this June!

Derek

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