Fashion
Japanese retail company Fast Retailing has launched HELP, a global initiative to help clothe refugees.
The project – dubbed 10 Million Ways to HELP will be run in conjunction with the UNHCR.
Collection starts at Uniqlo and GU on October 2 at stores around Japan and from mid-October in other markets.
According to a Uniqlo statement, UNHCR estimates the number of women, men, and children forcibly displaced owing to armed conflict and other causes reached 59.5 million by the end of 2014 – the highest since the end of World War II – prompting Fast Retailing to respond.
Fast Retailing has been implementing an All-Product Recycling Initiative to provide clothing to refugees since 2006, and in 2011 became the first company headquartered in Asia to establish a global partnership with UNHCR. As part of the initiative, Fast Retailing has also launched a drive to collect clothing from employees.
Around 90 per cent of the clothing that Fast Retailing has collected to date through its All-Product Recycling Initiative has been in wearable condition. As of the end of April 2015, more than 10 million items from the company had been delivered to refugees in 37 countries by UNHCR, including those in Jordan, Syria, Thailand and Nepal.
As another contribution to alleviate the plight of displaced people, from 2011 Fast Retailing has operated an internship program at Uniqlo stores in Japan for refugees and their family members, offering invaluable work experience to promote their self-reliance.
