Our Founding Principles
Christian Outreach for Africa was created in 2016 by a group of committed individuals that saw the need to act on their Christian faith by providing people in Africa with the opportunity to escape poverty.
The founders of COFA bring a business sense to their philanthropy that seeks permanent results, not temporary relief. The model that they developed to achieve this goal has key elements that distinguish it from typical charities:
Self-sustainability: COFA promotes economically viable capital projects that can be sustained by the local population.
Empowerment: COFA provides resources that enable people to bring themselves out of poverty.
Professional partnerships: COFA partners with capable and trustworthy individuals and organizations in Africa that understand local challenges and opportunities and can use their expertise to successfully execute our projects.
Local involvement: COFA values the input of local people, who understand the needs of their community and will take the initiative to address those needs with the resources that COFA provides. We work with dedicated local leaders who can see our projects to completion and ensure their long-term success.
Cost control: COFA maximizes the impact of its financial contributions by carefully controlling cost and giving local communities a stake in our work with their own contributions of money, goods and services.
Synergy: COFA integrates its educational, health care, job creation and housing programs in a manner that they support each other.
Management rigor: COFA is a U.S. based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. It works closely with African nonprofit organizations Christian Outreach for South Africa and Christian Outreach for Uganda. The three organizations have local executives and each relies upon highly qualified local law firms and accounting firms to ensure compliance with all laws and regulations and transparent financial reporting.