Restoring Health and Hope women & Girls in Amhara

Subject: Final Progress Report – Micro project #74794 (Retired)

Dear GlobalGiving Team,

I am submitting this final report for our micro project, “Emergency Health Access for 200 War-Affected Women & Girls,” which was marked retired 15 days ago.

I write to you with both gratitude and honesty. This is not the report we hoped to write. But it is the report our donors and your platform deserve.

1. What Happened After the Previous Report

As documented in our April 7, 2026 update, the project had received only one donation of $20 a meaningful gesture of trust, but far short of the $5,000 required to enroll 200 women in community-based health insurance for three months.

Over the following 90 days, BDCA continued outreach through local networks, and our GlobalGiving page. Unfortunately, no additional funds were raised.

The micro project was eventually retired due to insufficient funding.

2. How the Funds Were Spent (or Not Spent)

Let me be completely transparent:

• The $20 donation was never disbursed to BDCA.
  It remained pending with GlobalGiving and was never transferred to our bank account because the project did not reach the funding threshold required for payout.
• No health insurance packages were purchased.
  To protect beneficiary fairness and avoid creating deadly inequity (one woman treated, 199 left behind), we did not begin implementation.
• No administrative or operational costs were incurred against this project.

In short: $0 was spent from this micro project.
No funds were misused because no funds were ever received.

3. What We Did Instead – Without Project Funds

Even though the micro project could not launch, BDCA did not abandon the women who were waiting.

Using our own limited unrestricted reserves, we identified one critically ill displaced mother of three – the same woman mentioned in our April report. She had been suffering from severe abdominal pain for weeks.

We personally covered her $15 consultation fee, $8 in lab tests, and $22 for a 10-day course of antibiotics and pain management. Total: $45.

She is now recovering. One life was quietly saved – not through this micro project, but through the small, sacrificial giving of our own team.

We do not ask GlobalGiving or donors to count this against the project. We simply want you to know that the need was real. And we acted with what little we had.

4. Donor Stewardship and Ethical Closure

Because the $20 donation was never transferred, we have no donor funds to return or reallocate. However, we have taken the following steps:

• Attempted to contact the anonymous donor via GlobalGiving’s platform (where possible) to explain the retirement and express our gratitude.
• Ensured that our project page clearly reflects the retired status.
• Learned a painful but important lesson: for emergency health access in conflict zones, all-or-nothing funding models can leave vulnerable people waiting indefinitely.

We will use this experience to redesign future appeals – perhaps for smaller, phased interventions (e.g., “$75 to insure one woman”) rather than a large single cohort.

5. Final Words of Gratitude

To donor –Ibrahim, who gave $20:
Your gift was never spent, but it was never forgotten. It reminded us that someone, somewhere, believed in the women of Bahir Dar. That belief kept us going.

To GlobalGiving:
Thank you for the opportunity to propose this project. The retirement is disappointing, but your platform gave us visibility and a chance. We remain committed to transparency and to the women we serve.

Respectfully submitted,

Simachew Yigzaw
Executive Director
Bahir Dar Charity Association (BDCA)