In March, 2009, BBF President Luke Hingson accompanied by BBF Trustee Robert Versharen traveled to three pharmaceutical companies to present them with special recognitions for their significant product contributions. The three companies recognized were Impax Laboratories, Inc., Teva Pharmaceuticals, USA and Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Thanks to the many generous donations of medicines from these companies, Brother’s Brother Foundation has been able to help supply hospitals, clinics and hand-held mission trips world-wide with the supplies they need to treat patients who would have otherwise gone without.

BBF was honored by visits from Ambassador Hawa Ndilowe from Malawi and Ambassador Dr. Inonge Mbikusita-Lewanika from Zambia in March 2009. In coordination with the World Affairs Council of Pittsburgh, which hosted the visiting Ambassadors, BBF was pleased to welcome these representatives given BBF’s long history of work in both countries.

The last week of February, I was able to travel to Jamaica to tour the operations of some of Brother’s Brother Foundation’s long-standing partners. Food for the Poor (FFTP) has worked with BBF in Jamaica for many years.

BBF and International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC) have been working together for over fifteen years, bringing requested donations to those in need around the world. In late 2008, IOCC delivered 94,304 new Houghton Mifflin Harcourt textbooks to public schools and libraries in Lebanon in partnership with BBF. Some of the donated books went to one of the public libraries in Beirut. Children ran eagerly to the children’s corner to see the newly arrived colorful books. Librarian Robert Ajami found himself surrounded by children gazing at the books in his hands before he could get a chance to display the books on the bookshelves. He couldn’t resist reading to them while they eagerly listened and stared at the colorful pages.

Brother’s Brother Foundation distributed 520 oceangoing containers (over 6,500 tons) of requested donated medicines, books, hospital beds and other humanitarian items to those in need around the world. BBF maintained its 2008 rating in Forbes Magazine as one of the four most efficient charities in the USA as based on Forbes Magazine’s rating of 100% efficiency for BBF in fundraising and charitable commitment.

Forbes Magazine, in the December 2008 Investment Guide, noted Brother’s Brother Foundation (BBF) as one of the four most efficient charities in their Charity 200 listing. BBF was noted as having a 100% rating for both fundraising efficiency and charitable commitment. The issue lists 200 charities, rating them on how efficiently they collect or distribute donations.

Brother’s Brother Foundation (BBF) is working with colleague agency Food for the Poor out of Miami, FL to provide assistance to the 800,000 people in Haiti affected by Hurricanes Gustave, Hanna, and Ike.

Mr. Jack Farrell, formerly with McGraw-Hill Publishing who currently manages the activities of American Associations of Publishers (AAP), Medical Group, contacted BBF’s Education Coordinator, Carol Taylor, with a project to send books to 20 medical colleges in Iraq.

This seven days, Brother’s Brother Foundation (BBF) sends $3,949,584 of medicines to Kenya where civil strife has left 500,000 homeless and killed over 1,000. The requested medicines include antibiotics, anti-diabetics and anti-hypertensives and will be distributed by BBF’s implementing partner, Adventist Relief and Development Agency, to local hospitals in the affected area.

Brother’s Brother Foundation Provides an Unusually Large Amount – Over $70,000,000 – In Requested Donations to 20 Countries in January 2008