Make a splash to save lives
A new bikini goes on sale in H&M stores this spring to raise funds for international charity WaterAid and transform the lives of women and their families in Asia.
The brightly coloured bikini which has a tropical holiday theme will be on sale in the H&M’s stores across 21 sales countries during Spring and Summer 2005. Bikini buyers will be supporting WaterAid’s life changing work as 10 per cent of the retail price goes towards WaterAid’s projects in Asia. Sales of the WaterAid bikini, which costs ? 9,90 each for the top and bottom, will provide thousands of people in the world’s poorest countries with clean water and hygienic toilets – helping to save lives and fight poverty.
‘Clean water and sanitation are vital to reducing poverty in the developing world’, says Clare Davies, WaterAid’s Fundraising Manager in charge of the H&M campaign.
‘Women and children walk miles each day to collect water that is often dirty and unsafe, causing sickness in their families. A child dies every 15 seconds from water-related diseases. Yet most of these diseases are easily preventable. For around the same price as the bikini, WaterAid can provide a person in the developing world with a lasting supply of clean water.’
Ingrid Schullström, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility at H&M, says: ‘Water is fundamentally a women’s issue. In the developing world it is mostly women’s responsibility to provide water for the family and to care for those who fall sick. Last year H&M contributed over ? 70,000 to WaterAid’s projects in Bangladesh, enough to provide over 3,300 people with a lasting supply of clean water and sanitation. The co-operation is of great value to us since WaterAid’s projects are in areas where some of H&M’s suppliers are located and women living there may well be working in factories producing for us.’
2005 is the fourth year of this successful partnership. WaterAid hopes this year’s bikini will bring in even more funds and help thousands more people take the first steps out of poverty.
For more information please contact:
Annacarin Björne, telephone: + 46 8 796 57 57,
e-mail: annacarin.bjorne@hm.com.
Liv Asarnoj, telephone: + 46 8 796 53 82,
e-mail: liv.asarnoj@hm.com.
Note to editors:
WaterAid is the UK’s leading international charity dedicated exclusively to the provision of safe domestic water, sanitation and hygiene education to the world’s poorest people.
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