About the Australian Volunteers Program
The goal of the Australian Volunteers Program (AVP) is to contribute to sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction in Mongolia.
AVP has a long history in Mongolia. Since 1998 over 300 volunteers have mobilized through the program. Every year the AVP supports the deployment of around 30 skilled Australians to undertake volunteer assignments aimed at improving the capacity of partner organisations in sectors of high priority to Australian and Mongolian governments. These volunteers also promote positive people-to-people links between individuals, organisations and communities in Mongolia and in Australia.
Program Focus – Sectors
AVP Mongolia will continue to support assignments and placements which are developed to support Australia’s Aid program in Mongolia by contributing to sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction.
Whilst future assignments will retain the flexibility to respond to changing Australia and Mongolia priorities, priority sectors will include:
- improving educational outcomes;
- supporting a well-managed extractives sector;
- improving the lives of people with a disability;
- protecting children, vulnerable and minority groups;
- protecting and advocating for human rights;
- eliminating violence against women and working to achieve gender equality;
- supporting private sector partnerships to achieve development outcomes.
- supporting local agri-businesses;
- supporting the health sector, especially in the area of HPV vaccinations, fighting STIs;
- Implementing public-private partnerships to support development and public diplomacy objectives; and
- Supporting priority sports diplomacy and sports for development priorities.
Achievements of Australian volunteers in Mongolia
Volunteers have provided considerable assistance across a broad range of sectors in Mongolia and with over 300 assignments since 1998. It is impossible to provide a full list of all the achievements. However, the following examples provide a flavour of the important work Australian volunteers in Mongolia undertake.
- Susan Wilson is an Advocacy and Communications Adviser with the Save the Children’s Mongolia Program that focuses on child protection, child right governance, pre-school and primary education, disaster risk reduction and humanitarian relief. She assisted with the events of the program on disaster risk reduction in schools and psychological first aid at the recent Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction. Susan is currently working on strategy planning for 2019-2021 and analysing how child rights are implemented in Mongolia.
- Emma Nicholas is a Program Coordinator at Zorig Foundation of Mongolia, a leading democratic advocacy non-government organisation to empower Mongolians in making a difference in social and economic communities. Emma recently ran a Youth Camp where senior school aged Mongolian and American children met and networked.
- Edwina Pickering is a Communications and Event Support Officer at the National Emergency Management Agency of Mongolia (NEMA). She worked with colleagues from NEMA, RedR and United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction in organising and hosting the Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in July 2018 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The conference was successfully held involving 2500 delegates from 60 countries. Senator the Hon Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, Minister for International Development and the Pacific attended the conference.
Interested in having a volunteer in your organisation?
Volunteers are placed within partner organisations and work with counterparts and colleagues to contribute to building capacity within the organisation.
Australian volunteers mobilised through the Australian Volunteers Program work with a range of partner organisations including non-government organisations (NGOs), civil society and humanitarian organisations, government agencies, educational institutions, private sector enterprises and United Nations agencies.
If you are interested in having a volunteer in your organisation, please contact AVI on telephone: (976) – 76006421 or email [email protected].