Swiss organisation for international cooperation, promoting self-reliable, sustainable development in southern countries and in Switzerland itself, Helvetas works with rural population in Africa, Asia and Latin America in three central areas:
- Improvement of the rural infrastructure
- Promotion of the sustainable exploitation of natural resources
- Promotion of education and culture.
The organisation defines their mission as closely related to their conception of development, which for them resides on the provision of more food, better housing, increased production and public infrastructure for the poor, but also means more useful knowledge, more social responsibility, more solidarity, and more ecological consciousness.
The central aspects of their stated mission are:
- to work towards the goal of fulfilling the basic needs of all human beings;
- to work towards the goal of fulfilling the basic needs of all human beings;
- to create stable, i.e. predictable overall conditions which promote a holistic human development and make learning processes possible;
- to overcome the kind of dependencies which subject people to foreign economic and political interests;
- to replace the resulting lack of dignity with self-confidence and self-reliance;
- to reduce inequalities and strengthen communities within which all, men as well as women, can lead economically, politically and socially committed lives.
- to create stable, i.e. predictable overall conditions which promote a holistic human development and make learning processes possible;
- to overcome the kind of dependencies which subject people to foreign economic and political interests;
- to replace the resulting lack of dignity with self-confidence and self-reliance;
- to reduce inequalities and strengthen communities within which all, men as well as women, can lead economically, politically and socially committed lives.
Helvetas’ Head Office is located in Zurich, and they maintain two secretariats in Lausanne and Balerna. To promote local knowledge, they also employ 300 local indigenous staff on their offices abroad.