The IKEA Group participates in a wide range of social and environmental activities internationally, nationally and locally.
An organization called the IKEA Social Initiative handles social involvement on a global level. We work together with UNICEF and Save the Children to fight for children's rights to a healthy and secure childhood with access to quality education. Our projects take a holistic approach: improving the health of women and children, creating access to a quality education, and empowering women to create a better future for themselves and their communities.
Regarding environmental involvement, the IKEA Group works with WWF, the global environmental conservation organization, on projects that support responsible forestry, better cotton management, and to reduce our impact on climate change.
Improving children's rights in India The IKEA Social Initiative supports a project, run by UNICEF, promoting children's rights in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, from where IKEA sources many of its carpets. The aim is to prevent and eliminate child labor in the carpet belt by addressing root causes such as debt, poverty, lack of access to education, disability and ill health. Read more
Preventing child labor in cotton seed farming The IKEA Social Initiative supports a UNICEF project aimed at preventing girls from working on cotton-seed farms in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The project covers 104 villages, with 63,000 children expected to benefit from the project's focus areas.
The project helps children gain access to quality education, empowering girls' collectives to influence their communities, and raises awareness of child labor among NGOs and employers and local government. In addition, 70 government schools are being helped to improve the quality of the education they offer. Read more on UNICEF's website
IKEA customers help children in need Since it started in 2003 the IKEA Group has raised 6.9 million euros for children in need, from the sale of IKEA PS BRUM teddy bears and other soft toys. During a period leading up to Christmas, 1 euro for each soft toy sold is donated to UNICEF and Save the Children, financing projects to improve children's lives. Read more
In-kind donations and emergency-relief aid In emergency situations or situations of need, the IKEA Social Initiative helps with in-kind donations and aid. For example, supporting the emergency efforts of Save the Children in flood-affected areas of India and Bangladesh. After the 2004 tsunami, IKEA donated bed sheets, quilts, blankets, mattresses and toys to Indonesian, Sri Lankan and Indian victims. After the Pakistan earthquake in 2006 the IKEA Social Initiative donated 335,000 quilts to earthquake-affected families.
Sow a Seed project IKEA supports a project to reforest and maintain 18,500 hectares of lowland rainforest in Sabah on the island of Borneo in Malaysia, and to protect the area from logging for a period of 50 years. Sow a Seed has contributed to the building of homes, meeting places for social events, and field accommodations for the more than 150 workers and their families who work with the project. The project is a partnership between IKEA, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, the Yayasan Sabah Group, and the Malaysian forestry company RBJ. Read more
Forest Student Scholarship IKEA supports one-year scholarships for 22 students from Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine and Russia to study forestry at the Swedish University of Agricultural Science in Alnarp, Sweden. These scholarships have been arranged every year since 2001.
Cotton produced in a better way IKEA and WWF have started projects in Pakistan and India to introduce Better Management Practices for producing cotton in a more environmentally friendly and healthy way. Both countries have projects that will run for three years. The projects work with local cotton growing farmers in Farmer Field Schools. The aim is for 2,000 farmers in Pakistan to pass through the Farmer Field Schools during the three-year period and that 500 farmers will be trained in the Indian project. In Pakistan, the project started in 2005, while work began in India in 2006.
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