My Life, My Story: A Pathway to Resilience

The last few months were rather a successful season for HopeBox despite all the challenges brought by COVID-19. 

While we were navigating our way out of the pandemic and constant lockdown of Vietnam, we were so lucky to have the support of our partners and customers who have helped us reach over 3,000 mooncakes during the mid-autumn festival. We all appreciated that logistics during lockdown was extremely difficult but we’ve managed to spread the love of the season to our dear customers and their loved ones, no matter where they are. Thanks to the resilience of our women, and the wonderful support of our interns from Fulbright University Vietnam via their Social Impact Fellowship Program. 

Although Christian is not our religion, Christmas has always been one of our favourite seasons as it brings love and joy to our community. And we were able to make hundreds of boxes of cookies and giftset to our customers. This year we made it more special, with the impact funds provided by Australian Volunteer International, and the support of our strategic partners Project Pluto, a design studio who have developed a new concept for our merchandising products line including candles and tablewares. All candles were home-made by our women and we are so happy that our revenue streams are extended. Another season of SOLD OUT all products for Christmas and we are now getting ready for Lunar New Year’s gift sets. These seasons have lifted our HOPE for our women as we continue to offer them a workplace where they feel safe, earn stable incomes, gain experience and be creative. 

The last few months also saw us implementing our training program for our women, which was jointly funded by Free the Slaves and SK2 Funds from their small grant program. The women were provided with training in bakery, hand-made candle and crafting, lifeskills, trauma healing, English and entrepreneurship. These programs are important to us as they are not only enhance our women’s skills but also offer opportunities to more women who are victims of gender-based violence and human trafficking. 

We also had a piece of good news to share, during October, our founder Huong Dang won the Women of the Future Award South East Asia under the category of Social Entrepreneur. This is an innitiative from the UK government to recognise the contribution of women in society and those who create impact across sectors. To celebrate this special occation, our Ms. Dang was invited to the residence of UK's Ambassador to Hanoi - the H.E Gareth Ward for an English afternoon tea and discuss about the gender-based violence issues in Vietnam. 

This December, we are very honoured to be recognised as one of the 7 Excellent Blue Swallow (Excellent Social Enterprise) and awarded 50,000,000 VND in cash prize. The award was evaluated based on the key criteria of being resilient, pioneering, creative, proactive, breakthrough and compassionate. 

Blue Swallow 2021 is a 2-months event for social enterprise in Vietnam, organised by CSIP and partners with the Canadian Embassy and Oxfarm. The event offered training for social enterprise in design thinking, workshops with experts, promoted social enterprises stories, orgnaised hackathon competition and Gala to engage with policymakers and partners. We are indeed very proud to be part of the Blue Swallow Event 2022.

As we close the chapter of 2021, we would like to take this opportunity to send our appreciation to all our GlobalGiving community and sponsors who have walked with us in the last 365 days journey. May your holiday season be filled with love, good health and may peace be with you in every step of your 2022. 

From all of us at HopeBox - THANK YOU and Happy New Year!