How we use your contribution

 

When you sponsor a child through Cunina, you will make a monthly sponsorship contribution of 35 euros.  We would like to explain in more detail how Cunina spends your contributions. Should you still have questions after reading this information, please contact one of the Cunina employees.

30 euros of your sponsorship contribution go to the South

Cunina works together with partner schools in the South, each of which apply their own enrolment and school fees. Contributions are allocated to cover the tuition fees and the necessary school costs as seen in the list below. These costs differ based on the school location. 

If the costs associated with the sponsorship are higher than the monthly contribution of the sponsor, the parents or the student must also make a contribution to cover the financial difference.

If the costs are lower than the monthly contribution of 35 euros, Cunina will allocate the remaining funds from your contributions to finance educational projects in the country where your godchild resides. Thes projects are run to build or renovate Cunina partner schools, acquire didactic material or organize further training courses for teachers. 

What are the possible costs associated with your sponsorship?

  • Enrolment and school fees
  • School uniform and shoes
  • Books and school supplies
  • School bag
  • Other school related costs (e.g. meals, transportation, etc.)
  • Costs of local management of your sponsorship
  • Postage for the correspondence between you and your godchild
  • Foreign bank costs, currency exchange differences, telephone costs abroad, working visits, photos and reporting

5 euros go to administrative costs in Belgium

The amount of 5 euros is spent on the administration of your sponsorship file and the management costs of Cunina Belgium.  In order to accurately calculate this percentage, Cunina keeps an analytical accountancy.

The NGO legislation stipulates that the total management costs in relation to the total income may not exceed 20 percent.  This is a requirement to be able to issue official donation receipts for income tax purposes. Cunina goes a step further and strives to maintain management costs below 10 percent and with success. In 2019, they were only 9.55 percent.

Management costs include: rent, maintenance and repairs, energy, water, office costs, insurances, domestic travel costs, external services, depreciation, wages and management fees of operations in Belgium, taxes, training, library, domestic bank costs and exceptional expenses.  Wage costs in Belgium related to providing aid to the sponsored recipients, communication, fundraising and merchandising are not included in the administrative costs. 

Kinderen

Becoming a Cunina godparent is a long-term commitment. You play an important role in the life of your godchild and you see them become a young adult with opportunities. 

Yes, I would like to become a Cunina godparent

A non-recurring cost to activate your child sponsorship file

You will get a message to activate your child sponsorship file when we have received your child sponsorship application. The activation of the file is a non-recurring cost of €35.

Upon receiving, we send you a child sponsorship ‘package’ that contains: 

  • a picture of your godchild
  • an identification sheet of your godchild
  • information on the country of your godchild
  • practical information on the child sponsorship
  • information on the different projects of Cunina
  • the most recent Cunina Courant (our newsletter)
  • a payment form to make the monthly payments of your child sponsorship

 

From then on, we switch over to monthly payments of €30 for your godchild. You can indicate on the registration form how you would like to make these payments.

Tax benefit for Belgian godparents

Are you considering becoming a Cunina godparent, but are you still having second thoughts with the financial commitment of €30 per month? Remember that you get a tax benefit when donating to charity.

Cunina provides you with a tax certificate when you donate €40 or more on an annual basis, which a Cunina child sponsorship of €30 per month easily surpasses. You can use the details on the tax certificate to fill in the personal income tax declaration to get a reduction of 45% on your contributions.

This means that you will not actually be paying €30 a month, but only €16.5, thanks to this tax benefit. Then maybe you would even have enough budget to support two godchildren?