Overseas Child Sponsorship
90 percent of your Child Sponsorship donation will be distributed directly to the sponsor child or institution. Click here to sponsor a child today!
Millions of children around the world are trapped in the cycle of poverty.The Salvation Army Child Sponsorship Program assists helps children in developing countries achieve their potential.
- Register as a child sponsor today! (NSW, QLD, ACT)
- If you wish to sponsor a child but live outside NSW, QLD or ACT then please click here.
- If you are an existing sponsor and your sponsorship is handled by our Melbourne office then please click here.
How does child sponsorship work?
Your tax deductible sponsorship of $20 per month (paid annually, biannually, quarterly or monthly) will enable The Salvation Army to provide a child in a developing country with direct assistance for education and general care. The funds are sent to the local Salvation Army Headquarters which monitors the needs of each child and their situation.
Sponsoring an institution
You can also choose to become a ‘Discretionary Sponsor’ and support an entire institution, rather that an individual child.
Your tax deductible sponsorship of $25 per month (paid annually, biannually, quarterly or monthly) will benefit every child in an institution (usually a children's home, school or day care centre). Discretionary sponsors receive a yearly newsletter from the institution giving information on events and the activities of the children.
How are children’s needs determined?
We assist children in the full-time care of The Salvation Army or attending Salvation Army schools and day care centres who:
- Have parents who are poverty-stricken, low-income, unemployed and/ or single
- Are female and have been rejected because of their gender
- Suffer physical disabilities, often as a result of disease
- Experience any combination of the above factors.
Some children are able to continue with further education and, with sponsor consent, these students can be supported up to 22 years of age if they do well academically. On completion of studies they remain in Salvation Army care until suitable employment and accommodation is found. Many have no home or have been rejected by family because of gender.
Why sponsor through the Salvos?
Our program is small and runs on very simple lines. We handle all sponsorships within Salvation Army-operated children’s homes, institutions, schools and day care centres.
Your full donation is distributed through The Salvation Army in the recipient country, with only 10 per cent retained to partially offset administration costs such as postage, bank fees and staffing.
Communication between sponsor and child
As a sponsor, you will receive a photograph of the child you are supporting and a profile that includes the child’s name, date of birth, a brief history and present circumstances, along with details of any special needs your sponsored child may have. Twice each year, you should receive news from your child, as well as a newsletter from the Child Sponsorship Department.
You can also correspond with your child in two ways:
- Write directly to your child using the country mailing address on the photo card. Please use our address as the return address.
- Write via our Sydney headquarters (contact details below).
Feel free to send letters, cards, photographs and gifts like stickers and bookmarks, however, we do not encourage you to send parcels. Once again, please do not include your personal address on the information but instead use our address as the return address.
Where can you sponsor a child?
The Child Sponsorship Program operates in 24 countries:
- Asia
- Bangladesh
- India
- Indonesia
- Pakistan
- Myanmar (Burma)
- Philippines
- Sri Lanka
- South Pacific
- Fiji
- Papua New Guinea
- South America
- Argentina
- Brazil
- Paraguay
- Central America
- Belize
- Guatemala
- Haiti
- Jamaica
- Africa
- Congo (Kinshasa)
- Ghana
- Kenya
- Mozambique
- Uganda
- South Africa
- Tanzania
- Zambia
- Zimbabwe
How Salvation Army Child Sponsorship began
Salvation Army Child Sponsorship began in 1978, when Salvationists John and Mary Burn were asked by a Salvation Army missionary to find sponsorship for four Pakistani boys.
They advertised the needs of those first four boys in their Corps (church) newsletter, and by the end of the first day all the children had been sponsored.
Word spread and the missionaries wrote with more and more children, while John and Mary found more and more 'parents'. Over 2,000 children are now sponsored through the program, which is administered by the Child Sponsorship Department at The Salvation Army Territorial Headquarters in Sydney. The Salvation Army Australia Southern Territory (Vic., Tas., SA, WA, NT) also runs a Child Sponsorship Program. Visit their page.
Contact us 
The Child Sponsorship Department
The Salvation Army
PO Box A435
SYDNEY SOUTH NSW 1235
Ph: (02) 9266 9880, (02) 9266 9525 or 9266 9521
Fax: (02) 9266 9652
E-mail: child.sponsorship@aue.salvationarmy.org