Last Updated: 2011.09.21
Fast Retailing to Donate $2 Million to Somali Humanitarian Crisis Relief
Fast Retailing Co., Ltd.
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The Fast Retailing Group has decided to donate $2 million to Somali humanitarian crisis relief through its global partner, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The company will provide $1 million to this cause, while Chairman, President and CEO Tadashi Yanai, will make a personal donation of $1 million.
These funds will be used to assist displaced people by providing food such as special nutritional products to malnourished children and to help fund UNHCR emergency humanitarian relief efforts in Somalia and other countries in the region. In addition to this monetary donation, the FR Group will send one million articles of clothing through its All-Product Recycling Initiative to Somali refugees in Kenya.
Somalia is now dealing with its most severe drought in 60 years, in addition to violence and political instability. According to the UN, Somalia officially faces a famine and is now at Phase 5 of the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (indicating that at least two adults or four children out of every 10,000 individuals are dying of starvation each day).
On behalf of UNHCR, Johan Cels, the organization's Japan representative has "expressed deep gratitude to Fast Retailing and Mr. Yanai for this generous and life saving contribution to the victims of the drought and conflict in Kenya and Ethiopia." The UNHCR and Fast Retailing have been partners and became Global Partners since 2011. This donation is the largest contribution to date from Fast Retailing to a UNHCR refugee program.
The Fast Retailing Group is committed to making the world a better place. So far, it has managed to collect 4,230,000 articles of clothing through its All-Product Recycling Initiative. These items have been delivered to disaster survivors and refugees in 22 countries around the globe. We will continue to support people in need and "act as global citizens with ethics and integrity," as written in our corporate philosophy.
