Global Envision correspondent, Amanda Howe, caught up with Maya Ajmera, president and founder of The Global Fund for Children at a screening of the film Born Into Brothels.

The Global Fund for Children is a donor to Kids with Cameras, the organization that made this incredible documentary film with filmmaker Zana Briski. The Hollywood film community honored Briski with an Oscar for the Best Documentary in 2005. The movie tells the true story of children born to sex workers in Calcutta’s red light district and how a photographer, who taught the children to view their world through a camera lens, transformed their lives.

Amanda Howe: Shakti for Children is the publishing arm of your organization, The Global Fund for Children. How does this support your work on behalf of underprivileged children around the world?

Maya Ajmera: Growing up in North Carolina as the daughter of Indian immigrants, I lived in two worlds. It was hard for me to explain the wonderful, vibrant Indian culture that filled my home to my American-born friends. Nor were there any books available for children in the US that focused on sharing the incredible resiliency and creativity of children in less developed nations. So I founded The Global Fund for Children (GFC) in 1994 to create an organization with education as its core mission. Today, GFC gives nearly $30,000 in annual book proceeds to grassroots organizations that focus on issues related to children’s education.

In her conversation with Amanda, Maya Ajmera lauds filmmakers like Zana Briski – people who seek out and tell the stories of children living in poverty – and talks about her own work publishing children’s books to both highlight these stories and support her global grant-making activities.

AH: Your organization makes grants to programs that help children impacted by HIV/AIDS. How does this disease affect children differently than adults and how can the international AIDS-fighting community better address the specific needs of children?

MA: One way that the AIDS pandemic devastates the lives of children is that they are left orphaned – often with younger siblings to care for as well, and often while suffering from the disease itself. This incredible burden makes it nearly impossible for children to obtain an education. The international AIDS-fighting community needs to fund grassroots organizations that help AIDS orphans stay in school. Without an education, those children that survive will only slide further into poverty and disease.

AH: How do creative projects, like Born Into Brothels, help disadvantaged children?

MA: Creative projects can be a way to get people interested in an issue. Books, films, music, photography – all can help educate people about children’s lives. And because mainstream media often overlook the plight of children, alternative creative projects highlighting children’s issues help raise awareness and money for the grassroots organizations that GFC supports.

Another way we help raise awareness is through the GFC website. We’ve partnered with national public film library The Film Connection to offer people free rental of films told from the perspectives of young, third world protagonists.

Global Fund for Children gives nearly $30,000 every year to organizations that focus on children’s education.

AH: According to UNICEF statistics, the enrollment rate in primary schools is almost the same for boys and girls. Is this a recent achievement? What goals are left in improving access to education for both sexes?

MA: This is a recent achievement and it’s very haphazard. In certain countries in Africa the ratio of girls to boys in school is very lopsided in favor of boys. In many Latin American countries this trend is reversed, with more girls attending primary schools than boys.

GFC focuses on providing funds for programs that help boys receive an education. The growing number of boys at risk is becoming a global problem for several reasons. Boys, who make up the majority of the world’s child population, are the primary recruits for third-world armies and the pupils of religious leaders who teach intolerance. This is a soft national security issue.

I’m very excited about the work of an organization we’re funding in Afghanistan. The Afghan Institute of Learning takes boys off the streets and puts them in an educational environment that teaches tolerance in addition to reading and writing.

Nothing we do for boys takes away from programs that help girls or women. It’s actually about making women’s lives better by nurturing better husbands, fathers and sons. Girls’ education is still the best investment that a country can make in its economy because it reduces the birthrate, increases education levels, and improves children’s health.








Amanda Howe is an attorney specializing in Comparative Intellectual Property and Banking Law and currently working as a Legislative Analyst for National Write Your Congressman in Dallas, Texas. She interviewed Ms. Ajmera in February, 2005.

To read another Global Envision interview by Amanda Howe, see Female Literacy Key To Uncorking Middle East Development Genie.