How we work

According to the United Nations, poverty is more than the lack of income and resources. Limited access to quality education and basic health care services can contribute to the devastating cycle of poverty across many developing countries.

Vision Aid Overseas works hard to ensure that everyone, regardless of their gender, economic status and geographical location, has access to affordable eye care services and glasses.

To enable this work, our charity receives both grants and donations. Grants are a form of ‘restricted’ funding, meaning that the funding must be spent on a specified programme of activity, like a contract. Currently, our largest multi-year funding partnerships are with: 

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID): for 'School Eye Health in Sierra Leone', reaching 44,000 children and 988 teachers at 159 primary schools, within two years between 2019-2021. See full details.

The Clothworkers Foundation: for 'Primary Eye Care Pilot Project', reaching over 320,000 people and improving the skills of 240 Community Health Workers, 16 Community Health Officers, and three optometry Technicians, within three years between 2019-2022. See full details.

Specsavers: for ‘Embedding sustainable Eye Care Services in Zambia’, reaching hundreds of thousands of people via Primary Eye Care and School Based Eye Health activities, within three years between 2020-2023. See full details.

This kind of funding enables VAO as a charity to operate at scale, to plan for and deliver our work strategically, using the methods below. We are proud to hold smaller grants too. But grants still do not provide all the funding we need each year to deliver in full on our misison. As a charity, we rely on donations from our supporters to help us to forge ahead, to innovate, and suceed in helping the world to see.