Haven Community Foundation, an Irish charity co-founded by Irish businessman Leslie Buckley, spent more than €1.33 million on charitable causes in Haiti in 2016, its latest accounts show.
This represented a decline of 6 per cent on the previous year. The most significant expenditure reduction in the period was a decline of more than €600,000 in relation to housing and infrastructure support.
However, Haven increased funding to its agricultural, livelihoods and volunteer programmes.
The charity operates development programmes in Haiti and saw grant income more than double to about €281,000 in the 12 months to the end of December 2016, one of a number of factors that allowed the charity to record a surplus of more than €157,000. That compared with a loss in 2015 of €99,800.
Haven reported an 88 per cent increase in overall income on the back of increased fundraising activity in response to Hurricane Matthew, which hit Haiti in late 2016.
Accounts recently filed with the Companies Registration Office show that Mr Buckley donated more than €67,700 to the charity last year, a drop of almost 31 per cent on the previous period.
The Denis O'Brien-led Digicel Group, of which Mr Buckley is vice chairman, donated €29,300 in 2016 compared with €544,308 a year earlier.
Another donor company for which Mr Buckley is a board member was Independent News and Media, which gave €12,100 to the charity in 2016.
Merger
A significant help to Haven last year was the merger with the Soul of Haiti Foundation, which was set up in 2007 by a number of Irish entrepreneurs. A donation of €213,000 reflected a transfer of projects from the foundation to Haven in the early part of last year.
Irish Aid, Ireland’s official overseas development programme, provided a grant of €200,000 to Haven in 2016, up from €70,000 the previous year.
From its Dublin base, Haven employed an average of eight employees throughout the year at a cost of just under €252,000.
Haven Community Foundation was founded by Mr Buckley and his wife Carmel in 2008. Two years later, it began providing emergency relief focusing on sanitation and shelter in camps after an earthquake devastated the country.
