WWF's climate lessons

NEWS FROM THE WORLD OF NGOs

The World Wildlife Fund and Tetra Pak India are joining hands to conduct workshops all over the country in schools on climate change. The initiative will encourage students to make contribution to bring about a change in the environment.

The "Young Climate Savers" workshops will be held across 200 schools promoting energy-efficient lifestyles, eco-friendly attitudes and inculcating leadership and motivation skills. The programme plans to sensitise 50,000 students in two years.

Wrangler initiative for the homeless

Wrangler has tied up with NGO Habitat For Humanity, which is working for providing houses to the homeless. Habitat's current work, which comes under the umbrella of India BUILDS, is a five-year initiative to provide better housing for 2,50,000 low-income Indian families.

The campaign hopes to inspire individuals, officials and organisations to come up with innovative housing solutions for the 315 million Indians who don't have a place to live.

The initiative called "Join John's Brigade Campaign" is being launched by actor John Abraham. Wrangler will also provide co-branded T-shirts of Wrangler and Habitat for Humanity to all participants of the programme.

Wal-Mart to open schools

Wal-Mart has announced a grant of $1.12 million over a three-year period to NGO HOPE Foundation to set up industrial centres in five under-served communities in and around the factories of Wal-Mart's suppliers.

The grant was given by Wal-Mart's Ethical Standards department under its International Giving Programme. Each industrial centre by Hope will impart primary education as well as vocational training to children in the area, besides teaching them social skills.

The goal is to provide short-term, job-oriented education and training to 1,000 children annually. The centres will be located in Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, Panipat and Moradabad.

The location of each centre has been strategically chosen to ensure that they are close to industrial clusters, where many Wal-Mart suppliers' factories are located, so that factory workers, their families and the local community can benefit.

Vodafone offers aid for flood victims

The Vodafone Group Foundation has announced Rs 1.2 crore aid for flood victims in India. While Rs 40 lakh will be spent through Oxfam's "South Asia" appeal, the balance amount of Rs 80 lakh will be spent through local initiatives. The donation to Oxfam will help provide temporary shelter for 10,000 people.