We exist,
To empower poor, women and vulnerable households,
To bring about sustainable development and positive social transformation;
and promote human dignity for all citizens,
Vision
To see prosperous communities where all community members use their capability and
livelihood asset to realize a sustainable livelihood,
Goal
To contribute to the attainment of sustainable social services, food security and community development for the rural and semi-urban poor with sustained environmental management and healthy, literate and prosperous society.
About VoCDA
Vision Community Development Association (VoCDA) is an Ethiopian Residents Charity Organizations, which is engaged in the promotion of people’s self-development focusing on rural and semi-urban poor community who are the most vulnerable to the problems of under development in Urban and rural areas. VoCDA has been established in 2003, & registered with federal CSO agency as local NGO. • Registration No. 0129. • Entered in to Operational and project agreements with Federal and regional concerned bureaus.
How are you all readers and viewers of our website! we have developed this website as a way to make people aware of the services and/or products we are offering, understand why our services are relevant for the needy community, we serve, through different development endeavors and see which of our organization’s services qualities/potentials set our organization special. Moreover, the objectives of the website’s development are:
To increase our outreach capacity to reach more users and donors so that the organization can secure more funding and give more services to the needy people,
To Become a Confident resource of the information that disseminated on our websites to donors, to community in need and development practitioner in the social development sectors
To build our Brand in the development endeavor, through our services to the needy community to whom we are committed. To this end I believe the website is users friendly and easily usable as well.
Generally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the website developer’s firm, VoCDA staffs, and boards who participated throughout the process. Especial thanks go to Plan-International Ethiopia, who cooperates with us in supporting financially to enable us the website development become real.
VoCDA is a member of CoSAP, organizing women into Self Help Groups in Adami Tulu (ziway-Batu) and Dodata Woreda of Arsi zone in Oromiya regional state. VoCDA is helping over seven thousand (7,000 ) poor women that organized into 266 Self Help Groups(SHGs).
YOSEF AKALU
DIRECTOR - CoSAP
TREE AID has provided a technical and financial support for VoCDA in the implementation of
a rural development and environmental rehabilitation project in adamitulu jido komolcha and dugda
districts of Oromia regional state.
CHERU TESSAMA
COUNTRY MANAGER - TREE AID ETHIOPIA
IDH is a foundation that convenes public -private -community partnerships in key global agricultural,
garment and textile value chains as well as producing landscapes to adopt sustainable practices to
ensure sustainable production, optimal environmental protection and meaningful social inclusion for
development. In doing so, IDH mainly plays three roles: convening of key actors in sectors/landscapes,
co-designs and co-finances projects while assigning field level projects implementation to 3rd party. It
is in this context that IDH partnered with VOCDA through the Sustainable Landscape program(2015-
2023) that operated in the Dembel Shalla sub Basin of Ethiopia. VOCDA implemented 3 different
projects in the period 2018-2022 under the thematic are: Restoration and rehabilitation of degraded
land and development of alternative livelihoods for communities.
Among the remarkable qualities VOCDA exemplified throughout our collaboration were
1. A very dedicated team focused on results but also taking due process that is attuned to local
norms. This is in spite of the very small team size and logistics/facilities limitation VOCDA had.
2. Open to feedback and fine-tuning implementation approaches for improved results
3. Timely and very transparent in implementation and financial reporting
Among the many results VOCDA delivered during our collaborations, few that stand out are
❖ VOCDA established multiple successful bee keeping community enterprises. This is in the context
that the project area, mostly known for rampant agrochemical use, was feared unfit for beekeeping.
VOCDA team was able to identify ideal locations and community groups and make honey
production possible resulting in significant production and sells in local markets.
❖ VOCDA for more than 10 years in its operation in the Dembel Shalla Sub Basin, alongside its
degraded land restoration & livelihoods projects, every year, it identified community members
that protect existing/remnant woodland. These are community members that despite the
pressure to deforest and expand cultivation land, continued to protect woodland lots on individual
lands. These individuals are acknowledged during the yearly Farmers forest day that VOCDA
organizes to raise awareness on project interventions but also promote project products
❖ As a way to integrate reforestation and sustainable utilisation of non timber forest product, VOCDA
established a women’s enterprise and built their capacity to start Moringa and Aloe vera based
soap production. The women have been successfully selling their products in the local market.
❖ The VOCDA team, also worked to capacitate community groups to produce energy saving cook
stoves as a means to alleviate one of the drivers of deforestation in the area. Later in a new project,
they connected the previous groups to become suppliers of cook stoves to new groups in a new
location and also to share their experiences
Going forward I wish to see VOCDA collaborating with many more like minded organizations who can
leverage on the values VOCDA can offer to deliver on sustainable natural resources management and
utilization at the grassroots level and related fields.
Should you need more information, feel free to contact me regarding this testimonial
Mahlet Shebabaw Bekele, Senior Program manager, Sustainable Landscapes program at IDH Ethiopia
(June 2023)
Mahlet Shibabaw
Senior Program manager, Sustainable Landscapes program
Our Donors
Here are some of our donors from the past and present