Campaign Crusader - Eugene Veith

EUGENE VEITH – Founder and Director of Mission Enterprises Limited and Entrust

Problematic hearing aids, shaky hands and inoperable troubles with his left knee do not prevent Eugene Veith from powering on towards his 95 th birthday.

Eugene has dedicated his life’s work and earnings to helping those in need. Over the past 50 years Eugene has given in excess of $23 million to worthwhile causes.

And he has no plans to stop. “I always intended for my work to go on after I die,” he says.

A director of Mission Enterprises Limited (MEL), an organisation that he established 50 years ago, and its new off-shoot Entrust, Eugene channels funds to worthy causes in Australia and all over the world.

Beneficiaries include agricultural programs in Uganda that aid children orphaned by AIDS; micro-enterprises in the slums of Bangkok; anti child-trafficking education in Cambodia; and sewing classes in Mozambique.

Born in Melbourne, Eugene, who as a young man became bald as a result of alopecia – and subsequently coined his own nickname “ Curly” – grew up in a poor household in Gippsland.

Around the time of the Great Depression his father Charles, a butcher, went broke. Eugene took the business’ sole remaining asset, a truck, and used it to make deliveries for a Flinders Lane company called Scott Brothers. He soon turned that business into Veith Transport, Melbourne largest parcel-delivery company, sporting 175 trucks and 1500 clients.

Rather than fattening up his own pocket, Eugene chose to put his first profits towards financing a mission in India. “I didn’t wait till I was rich to start giving to others,” he says.

“I have never been rich in my life. Now I have enough to bury myself that’s about all.”

When Eugene sold Veith Transport in 1986, much of the profit went to Mission Enterprises Limited.

One of the first local projects Eugene supported, women’s shelter Benwerren , is still operating just a few kilometres away from Eugene’s home in a Doncaster East retirement village.

Entrust CEO Richard Beaumont, who has known Eugene for more than 30 years, says the enterprise is successful because it offers direct support to communities and people who would otherwise have no access to western aid. Entrust leverages the capital established by Eugene through MEL to fund other projects and relies on donors to help carry the load.

“We offer these projects to businesses, corporations, other foundations or high net worth individuals who say ‘I want to give but because of the Global Financial Crisis I don’t want to throw the money into some pot and never hear from it again.’ They want to give in a way that they know the money is going to get to where it’s meant to go,” he says.

For Eugene, who regularly attends Entrust board meetings and is up-to-date with all of the enterprise’s activities, there’s no room for self-congratulation.

“I don’t give myself the glory,” he says, “I am a Christian. I believe god has inspired me to do this, but it’s his work.”

Give Now to an international cause