Hold the Future
Hold the Future is a Hanoi, Vietnam based charitable organisation that offers vocational training and handicraft production to young people with disabilities. The Centre accepts young disabled people between the ages of 18 and 30 irrespective of their disability. Hold the Future aims to provide its members with the necessary life skills and support in order for them to achieve independent livelihoods.
Hold the Future maintains a blog at holdthefuture.org for news in English and a commercial site for product information and news in Vietnamese at vingaymai.com.
History
The Centre opened in 2002 to an initial intake of 10 people. At the beginning the focus was only on handicraft production although there was some small amount of training provided.
In 2007, with the assistance of Caritas Germany's first tranche of funding, the Centre started providing more structured vocational training. Much of the training since then has focused on traditional Vietnamese handicraft production such as silk embroidery, bamboo and lacquer art.
For more practical skills that allow disabled young people to find employment more quickly or make money with their own business, the Centre also adds training in sewing and tailoring, basic carpentry and silk flower manufacture.
Caritas Germany extended their sponsorship during the 2009 to 2010 period and for the first time the Centre was able to offer courses on soft skills with the aim to assist young people in attaining better self-esteem so that they are able to more confidently present themselves.
The Director
Le Minh Hiền is an active member of the disabled community spending much time on advocacy work. Her main focus is on employment rights for disabled people. She works with the ILO as well as local NGOs to promote disabled workers to employers and lobbies for equality in the work environment. Mrs Hiền, herself disabled through a serious road accident while in her final year at University, is the founding member of Hold the Future.
Mrs Hiền is Vice President of D P Hanoi (Disabled People of Hanoi). She is Chairwoman of the Ba Dinh District Disabled Community Group or DPO. The Centre is also a member of VABED (Vietnam Association of Business Enterprises of Persons with Disabilities) and a registered member of the NGO Vietnam save Disabled Children.
Recent achievements
This year Hold the Future has been deemed one of ten organisations to be promoted world wide by the East Meets West Foundation of the United States.
Handicraft production
Hold the Future produces a large range of products. Mostly these products are on order by clients. The largest client is Craftlink a member of the World Fairtrade Organisation. Hold the Future supplies an extensive range of silk flowers for international export through Craftlink.
Other items produced are rolled paper products such as jewellery boxes, bowls and small art pieces. Greeting and Christmas cards are made and sold during their seasons. Notebooks covered with hand embroidered design as well as notebooks made with recycled paper are made on order. Traditional Vietnamese lacquer art, traditional as well as modern embroidery items are some of the products made by disabled young people.