The Rotary Club of Balwyn’s Centenary Grants project, offering $1 million in funding to clubs across Australia, has announced its first round of recipients. The project marks Rotary’s centenary in Australia and celebrates the fundraising success of the club’s Camberwell Sunday Market.
By Amy Fallon
After a careful assessment of applications, the Rotary Club of Warrnambool, Vic, was awarded $45,000 for a water project in Papua New Guinea, while the Rotary Club of Sandy Bay, Tas, received $25,000 to help fund kitchen equipment for an emergency food provider.
Over the past four decades, Balwyn’s Camberwell Sunday Market, selling secondhand goods and all sorts of knickknacks, has become a Melbourne icon and tourist attraction, funding more than $19 million worth of Rotary projects.
In 2021, the club announced it was establishing the five-year Balwyn Centenary Grants project to offer funding of between $10,000 and $100,000 to Rotary club applicants across Australia to pursue their programs – to celebrate the market’s success and as a centenary gift “from one club to another”.
However, due to COVID-related closures, the donation for the September/November funding round was significantly reduced.
“Open 50 weeks of the year every Sunday morning until midday, Camberwell Market’s 380 stalls are managed by the Rotary Club of Balwyn to generate income, which has allowed many phenomenal projects to be established in Australia and overseas.”
Both the Warrnambool and Sandy Bay clubs demonstrated past and future hands-on and financial commitment to their projects.
In the first round, Warrnambool received funds to help buy tractor equipment to efficiently put down a bore in PNG, allowing pregnant mothers, children, the aged and people with special needs better access to water. After four years of using hand driven augers, Warrnambool’s aim is to mechanically drill 60 bores in the country’s Oro province to provide clean water for 20,000 Papuans.
Sandy Bay asked for funds to help purchase cooking and kitchen equipment for Loaves and Fishes Tasmania, which collects, prepares and distributes food across the state’s south, while training young people in hospitality. By increasing their existing production, it’s estimated the organisation can make between 4,000 to 6,000 extra meals per week, and train another 30 unemployed people.
Normally open 50 weeks of the year every Sunday morning until midday, Camberwell Market’s 380 stalls are managed by the Rotary Club of Balwyn to generate income, which has allowed many phenomenal projects to be established in Australia and overseas. Unfortunately, COVID restrictions shuttered it for most of 2021, reducing the grants funding to $70,000 for the November round, and $50,000 for the May
2022 round.
However, the club believes the project will still lead to many more extraordinary Rotary initiatives around Australia. New ventures in the areas of community and social development, the environment, Indigenous support, and youth support will be prioritised.
Preference is being given to programs directly benefitting a large number of people or organisations, those that can be completed within a year, and projects that illustrate the benefits and outcomes will be sustained without further funding from the Balwyn club.
Relevant information and application forms have been sent to every district governor in Australia and are available at www.balwynrotary.org.au.
