The Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) Agencies

The Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) is a group of development agencies with mandates ranging from health and education to architecture, culture, microfinance, disaster reduction, rural development, the promotion of private-sector enterprise and the revitalisation of historic cities. AKDN consists of the following organisations:

Aga Khan Academies (AKA)

The conviction that home-grown intellectual leadership of exceptional calibre is the best driver of society's future development led His Highness the Aga Khan to found an integrated network of residential schools in Africa, South and Central Asia, and the Middle East, known as the Aga Khan Academies.

Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance (AKAM)

The Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance (AKAM) is a not-for-profit, non-denominational, international development agency created under Swiss law. Its headquarters are in Geneva, Switzerland. It is governed by an independent Board of Directors. The Chairman of the Board is His Highness the Aga Khan.

Aga Khan Education Services (AKES)

Aga Khan Education Services (AKES) currently operates more than 300 schools and advanced educational programmes that provide quality pre-school, primary, secondary, and higher secondary education services to students in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Kenya,Uganda, Tanzania, and Tajikistan.

Aga Khan Foundation (AKF)

The Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) is a non-denominational, international development agency established in 1967 by His Highness the Aga Khan. Its mission is to develop and promote creative solutions to problems that impede social development, primarily in Asia and East Africa. Created as a private, non-profit foundation under Swiss law, it has branches and independent affiliates in 15 countries. It is a modern vehicle for traditional philanthropy in the Ismaili Muslim community under the leadership of the Aga Khan.

Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED)

The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED) is an international development agency dedicated to promoting entrepreneurship and building economically sound enterprises in the developing world. AKFED focuses on building enterprises in parts of the world that lack sufficient foreign direct investment. It also makes bold but calculated investments in situations that are fragile and complex.

Aga Khan Health Services (AKHS)

With community health programmes in large geographical areas in Central and South Asia, as well as East Africa, and more than 200 health facilities including nine hospitals, the Aga Khan Health Services (AKHS) is one of the most comprehensive private not-for-profit health care systems in the developing world. Building on the Ismaili Community's health care efforts in the first half of the 20th century, AKHS now provides primary health care and curative medical care in Afghanistan, India, Kenya, Pakistan, and Tanzania, and provides technical assistance to government in health service delivery in Kenya, Syria and Tajikistan.

Aga Khan Planning and Building Services (AKPBS)

The Aga Khan Planning and Building Services (AKPBS) works to improve the built environment, particularly housing design and construction, village planning, natural hazard mitigation, environmental sanitation, water supplies, and other living conditions. AKPBS achieves these goals through the provision of material and technical assistance and construction management services for rural and urban areas.

Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC)

The Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) focuses on the physical, social, cultural and economic revitalisation of communities in the Muslim world. It includes the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, the Aga Khan Historic Cities Programme, the Music Initiative in Central Asia, the on-line resource ArchNet, and the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Aga Khan University (AKU)

Aga Khan University (AKU) provides post-graduate training of health service professionals, teachers and managers of schools, and the development of research scholars. It was granted its charter in 1983 as Pakistan's first private, autonomous university.

Focus Humanitarian Assistance (FOCUS)

Focus Humanitarian Assistance (FOCUS) is an international group of agencies established in Europe, North America and South Asia to complement the provision of emergency relief, principally in the developing world. It helps people in need reduce their dependence on humanitarian aid and facilitates their transition to sustainable self-reliant, long-term development. Focus Humanitarian Assistance is affiliated with the Aga Khan Development Network, a group of institutions working to improve opportunities and living conditions, for people of all faiths and origins, in specific regions of the developing world. Underlying the establishment of FOCUS by the Ismaili Muslim community is a history of successful initiatives to assist people struck by natural and man-made disasters in South and Central Asia, and Africa.

University of Central Asia (UCA)

The University of Central Asia (UCA) was created to offer an internationally recognized standard of higher education in Central Asia and create knowledgeable, skilled and creative graduates who will contribute leadership, ideas and innovations to the transitioning economies and communities of the region.

Source: www.akdn.org