Still giving hope - Concern is 50

It was the suffering of the people of Biafra, in west Africa, that prompted the creation of the aid organisation, Concern.

Fifty years on, it is both a joy to see it still operating and a tragedy that its work is still needed.

The poet, Seamus Heaney, who was a patron of Concern Worldwide, put it best when he described the organisation as “a magnificent answer to all the negative thoughts conjured up by the words Biafra, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Sudan, Cambodia, Somalia, Rwanda...”

From small beginnings, Concern is a worldwide charity in more than name.

Every year, it reaches in the region of 20m of the world’s poorest people in more than 25 countries, offering them freedom from hunger, disease, and ignorance and hope for the future.

It has a huge range of programmes, working to improve the survival, health, nutrition and well-being of vulnerable communities.

As an Irish charity, it also does us proud, as it forges a bridge of solidarity with some of the world’s poorest people.