[ 2014.11.12 ]
©Josh Estey/CARE
The global humanitarian organization CARE has been selected as the beneficiary of H&M's 2014 holiday campaign. Funds from the promotion, which runs from Nov. 13 to Dec. 31, will advance CARE's work to empower women entrepreneurs and workers from low-income urban communities in Ethiopia.
One-third of the population in Ethiopia lives in poverty. In Addis Ababa, the country's capital, almost 40 percent of households are headed by women, and more than 70 percent of these households are considered poor. CARE knows that encouraging and facilitating entrepreneurship is a vital step to the empowerment of women. CARE's work in Ethiopia includes enabling women to develop business opportunities that generate income, create a more equal balance of power in the home and enhance self-esteem. The project also includes women-owned enterprises that deliver support services such as child care, health care and catering. These services will enable other women to start their own enterprises while still assuming family responsibilities, thus creating a positive and growing cycle of change where women help empower other women.
From Nov. 13 to Dec. 31, H&M will sell special gift labels in stores worldwide. For every set of holiday gift labels sold, the H&M Conscious Foundation will donate double the sale price to CARE. Helena Thybell, Global Manager at H&M Conscious Foundation says: "We care deeply about this issue; through this project we will not only help women to start and run their own business and support them in making their business more successful, but also support them in how they can address the gender related issues that they face daily." She continues; "We are very happy to be able to contribute in raising awareness about the importance of women empowerment on a global level and we hope to see a generous engagement from H&M customers around the world during the holidays."
Robert Glasser, secretary general of CARE International adds: "This holiday campaign provides CARE with the opportunity to engage millions of people around the world in fighting one of the greatest injustices of our time: women and girls suffering disproportionately from poverty. At the same time women and girls are the key to overcoming it. For every additional year a girl spends in school, she will raise her family's income by 10-20 percent. When you invest in women and girls, everyone benefits."
Women's empowerment is key
The majority of the world's 1.3 billion poorest people are women and girls. Today, women and girls are often prevented from exercising their rights to fully participate in society. CARE believes women and girls hold the key to the fight to reduce poverty, and to making the greatest improvements to the lives of people. Empowered women contribute a great deal to the prosperity, health and happiness of their communities and to a more promising future for the next generation.
For more info: http://www.care-women.org
ABOUT CARE
Founded in 1945, CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty and providing lifesaving assistance in emergencies. CARE places special focus on working alongside poor girls and women because, equipped with the proper resources, they have the power to help lift whole families and entire communities out of poverty. Last year, CARE worked in 87 countries around the world and reached more than 97 million through 927 poverty-fighting programs to improve basic health and education, fight hunger, increase access to clean water and sanitation, expand economic opportunity, confront climate change and recover from disasters.
ABOUT H&M CONSCIOUS FOUNDATION
The H&M Conscious Foundation is an independent non-profit global foundation initiated in connection with H&M's 60th anniversary in 2007. The foundation is the philanthropic arm complementing H&M's sustainability work. Through its support to programs and initiatives, the H&M Conscious Foundation strives to make positive impact on policy level and in the everyday life for people and communities where H&M operates. For further information, visit www.hm.com/consciousfoundation
