The United Nations Delegations Women's Club.

Nearly 8,500 children in a devastated zone of Darfur, Sudan, will be able to return to school because of a humanitarian effort originating 7,000 miles away. The United Nations Delegations Women's Club (UNDWC) held an international food fair and bazaar in April 2005 in New York City to fund the repair and rebuilding of 40 brick schoolhouses in the villages of Arara, Masterti, Beida and Knavo Haraz, close to the border with Chad. Created by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the project also helps in building capacity for school authorities and parent-teacher committees, mobilizing community participation and encouraging enrolment and retention of girl students.

Similar projects supported through bazaar sales have been a hallmark for many years of UNDWC, which seeks to promote and display cultural diversity while doing good in diverse corners of the world. Women delegates and spouses of diplomats are eligible for membership in the Club. "At the beginning of its existence, UNDWC was largely a social club in which the wives would inform each other about their respective cultures and help one another to contend with life in New York", said Danara Kazykhanova, chairperson of the 2005 bazaar and wife of Kazakhstan's Permanent Representative to the United Nations.

Since the Club's founding in 1963, its mainstay programme has been its National Displays and Teas, hosted by different Permanent Missions, which provide a unique opportunity to exchange views and develop an appreciation for different cultures and traditions. UNDWC also organizes language lessons, home nursing classes, and bridge and canasta tournaments. Among its recent projects are: construction of a home-craft centre in Zambia; a literacy education in Bangladesh; a school network in Nicaragua; a women-run clothing factory in Timor-Leste; a women's literacy centre in the Solomon Islands; and a day-care centre for mentally and physically disabled children in Georgia.

The bazaars fulfil an educational and a philanthropic objective. The first effort of UNDWC to take on a more philanthropic role started with selling UNICEF Christmas cards by volunteer women dressed in their national garb. Eventually, Club members began raising funds for substantive projects overseas, which are designed to benefit women and children directly, and their in-the-field deliveries are carried out by a UN agency, usually UNICEF or the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. The 2005 fund-raiser was open to the general public, with over 100 Permanent Missions donating goods and items for sale that reflect the art, culture and handicrafts of Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe. The Club has raised over $120,000. "These events not only give something to the world from New York", said Mrs. Kazykhanova, "but also bring the world to New York."

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