Cesvi is an independent lay Italian humanitarian organisation, founded in Bergamo in 1985.

In the values which guide CESVI, the moral principle of human solidarity and the ideal of social justice are transformed into humanitarian aid and development, reinforcing an affirmation of universal human rights.

CESVI believes strongly that helping the underprivileged in developing countries, or those in difficulty due to war, natural calamities and environmental disasters, does not help only those who suffer, but contributes also to the well-being of all of us on the planet, “common home” to be looked after for future generations.

In the acronym CESVI, the words cooperazione e sviluppo (Cooperation and Development) underline the fact that CESVI bases its philosophy on the idea of giving the recipients of aid a leading role, working together for their own natural benefit. It is for this reason that CESVI is strongly committed to making sure that international aid does not become mere charity, and nor is it influenced by the donors’ self-interest.

CESVI assistance to people in need around the world can be divided into three main categories:

-Immediate help to ensure survival and to overcome emergencies

-The rehabilitation and reconstruction of systems destroyed by war or natural calamities

-Cooperation programs and projects for the development of underprivileged social groups and poor communities.

CESVI, an independent lay association founded in 1985, is today one of the most important humanitarian organisations in Italy. 

WORK
CESVI IN EMERGENCIES
CESVI, with 30 centres abroad, intervenes in every continent to deal with every type of emergency: from famine (in the Far East) to epidemics (malaria and dengue in the Far East, endemic diseases in Africa), from assistance to refugees (in Eritrea and Timor) to help for flood victims (in Caracas, Mozambique, Bangladesh, Nicaragua and Honduras for Hurricane Mitch and in Orissa, India for the "super-cyclone").

CESVI AND RECONSTRUCTION
When the emergency is over, CESVI becomes involved in reconstruction. It intervened after the earthquakes in Turkey, in the Balkans and after the war in Bosnia.

To prevent hotbeds of aggression from forming, CESVI has set up the Babylon Centres in Macedonia to teach young people from many and varied ethnic backgrounds to live together. CESVI, the first Western organisation to operate in North Korea with its own personnel, sent food from Vietnam to North Korean kindergartens. This food was developed and produced by the Infant Nutrition Centre which CESVI itself created in the early '90s in Ho Chi Minh City to fight infant malnutrition. In North Korea CESVI was able to start the first farming development projects in 1999.

CESVI FOR DEVELOPMENT
The words "cooperazione e sviluppo" (cooperation and development) in the CESVI acronym define the end purposes of the association: fair and sustainable civic and economic development among peoples, implemented by helping the poor people of the world through joint cooperation.

Not with charity and handouts, but by designing and supporting development plans that make use of local resources and mobilise of the population.

Projects using the "Food for Work" method are under way in Laos, building roads and public works while, in Cambodia, CESVI is reorganising the health system in the remote forest of Koh Kong. Development projects in the micro-business field - where women are the main protagonists - have been set up in Vietnam, India, Nepal, Palestine, Uruguay, Paraguay and East Timor. Other economic and civic development projects have been set up in the shanty-towns of Rio and Caracas. School building in Ethiopia, Niger, Togo, Mali and Orissa, in India. 

CESVI FOR THE ENVIRONMENT
CESVI has instigated development projects in areas of the planet that are particularly delicate from the environmental point of view. In Thailand it has rebuilt the economy of the fishing villages of the Malay minority, protecting the coastal strip that goes from the coral reef to the mangrove forest. Survival projects for the native community are in progress in the Amazon forest of Peru and the depressed areas of Zimbabwe, a transit zone between the major African parks for animals in danger of extinction. Other non-destructive fishing projects have been implemented in the "inner delta" of the Mekong in Laos, home of the fresh-water dolphin. A pilot forest fire prevention project is currently in progress in Laos.