Salve Fund: Georgia-France fund helps vulnerable youth

A new joint fund between Georgia and France has been established to support children from vulnerable families in Georgia.

Georgia’s Justice Minister Thea Tsulukiani and President of the Georgia-France Chamber of Commerce and Industry Antoine Bardon officially registered the Salve Fund at Tbilisi Public Service Hall today.

Photo by the Justice Ministry's press office.

The Fund aimed to:

• Finance projects for children living and working on the streets; and
• Eliminate malnutrition problems in newborn children from vulnerable families.

The first people to donate to the Fund were the former French Ambassador to Georgia Renaud Salins, as well as French, Georgian and American businessmen working in Georgia.

"Together with our French friends, today we opened the Fund which will contribute to the financing of projects aimed at helping children living and working on the streets,” Minister Tsulukiani said.

She added the Fund would allow parents of vulnerable infants visit Public Service Halls with their birth certificates to receive special support packages.

"Along with other basic things the package will include vitamins, which in accordance with UNICEF standards, are necessary to eliminate malnutrition,” Tsulukiani said.

She noted today more than 100,000 children were suffering from malnutrition in Georgia.

"That’s why I decided that one of the purposes of the Fund should be to eliminate food shortages. I would like to thank Georgia’s French friends and especially Mr. Antoine Bardon for his support,” Tsulukiani added.

The idea to establish the Fund was first declared last week at a dinner held by the Georgia-France Chamber of Commerce in Kazbegi, a small mountainous town in north-eastern Georgia. The event, attended by local and foreign businessmen, hosted an auction where 10,000 GEL (about $ 4,000/€ 3,700*) was collected as initial capital of the Fund.

* Currencies are as of today’s National Bank of Georgia exchange rate.