The Barbara Ward Children's Foundation (BWCF) was founded with a generous gift from the late Barbara Ward, pictured here, and registered by the Charity Commission in December 2001. Since then the Trustees have reviewed more than 7600 grant requests and authorised grants of over £12 million to more than 465 organisations (see Grant List). The charity has made grants in respect of charitable activities throughout the United Kingdom, but also around the world, helping children in Barbados, Belarus, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Kosovo, Malawi, Nepal, Peru, the Philippines, Romania, Russia, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda, Ukraine and Zambia. The BWCF is a small grant-making body that helps the smaller non-religious charities to serve severely disadvantaged children anywhere in the world where our grants are likely to make a real difference. To do this the BWCF focuses its support on financially healthy children's charities where funding is not forthcoming from statutory bodies, where incomes and fund balances are constantly put to good use and where administration overheads are kept to a minimum. We welcome all applications that fit these simple criteria.

The Foundation is currently supported by eight Trustees Chris Banks, Brian Walters, Ken Parker, Chris Brown, David Bailey, Sue Lowe-Lauri and, husband and wife, Ian and Keeley Sharland.