Helmut Kutin was born in Bolzano, Italy, in 1941. Following a family tragedy, he was admitted to the world's first SOS Children's Village in Imst, Austria, in 1953. Later he moved to the SOS Youth House in Innsbruck, Austria. After his graduation from high school, Kutin enrolled as a student of economics at Innsbruck University.
Kutin gave up his work in the field of tourism and as a tutor, and took on his first assignment for SOS Children's Villages International.
He started the construction of the first Vietnamese SOS Children's Village in what is now Ho Chi Minh City.
In 1968, Kutin was appointed director of the village, at the time the biggest SOS Children's Village in the world. He subsequently set up and supervised further SOS Children's Village facilities in Vietnam before he had to leave the country one year after the end of the war in 1976.
In response to his outstanding achievements for SOS Children's Villages, Helmut Kutin was appointed SOS Children's Villages International's representative for Asia in 1971. Thanks to his pioneering work, over fifty SOS Children's Villages and another fifty supporting facilities were built in Asia within a few years. Other major achievements include the resumption of SOS Children's Villages' work in Vietnam in 1987 and the opening of the first two SOS Children's Villages in China in the same year.
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