I refer to the article “NKF to get back to active fund-raising” (Sunday Times, Apr 6).
Need to return to active fund-raising?
It states that “Nearly a decade after the T. T. Durai scandal, the National Kidney Foundation (NKF) is ready to come out of its shell and return to active fund-raising.
It needs to do this because the number of donors has plunged to a record low even though more money is needed to cope with the rising number of kidney failure cases here.”
$6.6m surplus?
In this connection, according to NKF’s latest annual report for 2012/2013 – the total surplus for the year was $6.6 million.
So, why is there a need to step-up fund raising again now?
6 years of reserves over expenditure, assuming 0 donations?
Moreover – “Our current year reserves (unrestricted funds) increased by $8.9 million to $259.7 million and are adequate to fund 3.4 years of annual operating expenditure, slightly below last year.
Annual operating expenditure, for the purpose of the Statement of Reserves, represents the total gross annual expenditure of the Foundation adjusted for inflation and projected capacity increases.”
As to “The above is based on the assumption that the Foundation does not receive any income from:
(a) our dialysis activities (i.e. insurance claims, government grants, payments from patients) or
(b) donations.
However, since the Foundation is expected to continue to receive income from our dialysis activities, the ratio based on the net operating expenditure (i.e. gross operating expenditure minus dialysis income) will increase to approximately six years, same as last year.
As the current reserve level of approximately six years is above the Foundation’s target of five years, in line with the Code of Governance, fundraising shall be limited to targeted donations/ sponsorships to fund new projects e.g. for the building of new dialysis centres and prevention and education programmes”
– does the above projection of about 6 years of reserves over expenditure – mean that we are assuming zero donations in the future?
8 years of reserves over expenditure?
How realistic is it to assume that the current $19.7 million of donations a year, may become zero going forward?
– If we include the omitted “any income from donations” ($19.7 million) into the projections – does it mean that the ratio of the number of years of reserves to expenditure may increase to about 8 years?
On a relative basis – how many Voluntary Welfare Organisations (VWOs) have about 8 years of reserves?
Leong Sze Hian
