In the realm of the heart, in the domain of the mind, there are no geographical lines dividing the nations.
--Anna Howard Shaw, minister and activist

INTERNATIONAL

Once again this year, the great challenge for international organizations is to remind donors, justly concerned about the crises in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now wearied by war abroad and threats of terrorism at home, that the rest of the world demands our attention too. The magnitude of the problem--the growth of HIV/AIDS in Africa, India, and now China, the lack of affordable and available medical care, and extreme poverty in developing countries--is only obscured from view by the more visible crises we see before us every day. But childhood diseases in Uganda, human rights abuses in Mexico and Thailand (where free trade has brought jobs, but not necessarily codes of conduct), and extreme poverty around the world, do not vanish when other stories dominate the news. So we invite your renewed attention to small organizations in your own community doing excellent and cost-effective work to solve a host of critical problems around the globe—providing health care, training health care providers, offering opportunities to women entrepreneurs who might otherwise have no way to support their families, advocating for international assistance where problems require broader solutions, and making small loans where even fifty dollars can mean the difference between eating and starving. Your investment, of interest and resources, goes very far indeed.