We believe everyone has the ability to help us in our drive to improve the lives of ordinary Timorese people.

Some people have in-demand specialist skills and the ability to come to Timor Leste and work alongside HIAM Health’s staff in the field, directly helping people while also building the capacity of our team to continue the work.

Others who are unable to travel here are still able to assist from afar, providing the funding that allows our team to reach more people and change more lives. Even something as simple as running a cake stall will raise a few more dollars – money that goes much further here than in most of our international supporters’ countries.

For more than 20 years, our reach has been boosted by others who had the same reaction that HIAM Health’s founders, Rosaria Martins da Cruz and Jill Hillary, had when they saw the obvious and immediate need faced by the citizens of newly-independent Timor Leste: I need to help make this better.

The difference now is that HIAM Health is a mature organisation that’s proven its ability to find practical Timorese solutions to Timorese problems.
Volunteers will get the benefits of partnering with a Timorese-led organisation that understands life here. Of course – it’s our home!
HIAM Health might have started with a simple goal but it has grown into a much more diverse organisation. From a single room at the Guido Valadares National Hospital in Dili, we now have a training, accommodation and administration centre in Dili’s Comoro suco.
Our on-the-ground knowledge and expertise have seen us sought out by major international players in the development sector because we are small, nimble and efficient.

While child malnutrition remains our primary focus, our work now is less about remediating the effects of insufficient diets and instead we put a greater focus on preventing children becoming malnourished in the first place.
1: Training the next generation of Timor Leste farmers in the best techniques;
2: Improving the quality of school meals by buying farmers’ excess crops;
3: Promoting Moringa as a superfood to help address malnutrition;
4: Going to villages in the districts to teach high-nutrition gardening;
5: Teaching the principles of nutrition-sensitive agriculture;
We always welcome people who have skills in these areas and have the ability to base themselves in Timor Leste. It doesn’t just have to be direct practical skills – HIAM Health can only achieve what it does because of a dedicated team of support staff looking after important behind-the-scenes tasks like finance, administration, communication, IT and maintenance.

For Australian residents, your contribution to HIAM Health is tax deductable, thanks to our partnership with Action on Poverty (AOP).
Since 2007 we have worked together, with AOP serving as a monitor to verify that the money donated to HIAM Health only goes where it should: to the relief of the needy in Timor Leste.

Donate via AOP

For our international supporters, you can donate directly to our bank account in Timor Leste by contacting our office. Every year, our books are subject to an independent professional audit to ensure donations are going where they should. Donate directly