MSC FOR UNICEF

Bringing hope and education

Plastic now pollutes worldwide, from the highest mountains to the rivers and deepest reaches of our seas. Children are the future but, without education, their potential is denied them. The innovative UNICEF programme "Plastic waste to schools" in Ivory Coast tackles both these problems effectively while simultaneously combatting poverty and assisting women empowerment.

MSC is partnering UNICEF as the sole funder of this powerfully innovative programme to clean up the environment and transform the lives of children, women and their communities in Ivory Coast. Together, we can bring hope for the future and help ensure the miracle of a child's life is never denied its promise.

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The programme: Plastic waste to schools

PLASTIC WASTE TO SCHOOLS

MSC is partnering an innovative multi-pronged UNICEF programme in Ivory Coast that combines environmental conservation, poverty reduction, women empowerment and children’s education. Currently, only 5% of plastic waste in Ivory Coast is recycled and the waste collectors — mainly women — are trapped in a cycle of poverty. They often have to take their children to the waste tips where they work, since 87% of children aged 3 to 5 can't go to school because there aren't enough classrooms, denying them the opportunity to build essential skills for life. The "Plastic waste to schools" programme pays the waste collectors a fair price regularly, lifting them out of poverty while recycling the plastic waste to make innovative building bricks for the low-cost construction of much-needed classrooms.

ORGANISATION: UNICEF – United Nations Children's Fund.

COUNTRY: Ivory Coast.

PROGRAMME NAME: Plastic waste to schools.

PROGRAMME: To foster a women-empowering recycling market that recycles plastic waste into safe and durable low-cost building materials, starting with new classrooms.

STRATEGY: Build classrooms while empowering women and cleaning up the environment.

IMPACT: Environmental conservation, education, community support.

TIMEFRAME: 2019-2021.

GOAL: Raise USD 3.75 million to clean up the environment and take 66 women out of poverty per year, recycling 880,000 kg of plastic waste into innovative building bricks to build 152 low-cost, modern, community-built classrooms, enabling 8,360 more children to go to school.

The programme: Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Foods

UNICEF’S RELIEF PROGRAMME FOR MALNOURISHED CHILDREN

Plumpy’Nut® is a Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food endorsed by the World Health Organization to treat severe acute malnutrition in just six weeks at home, without hospitalisation. UNICEF has organised a complete family support programme, monitoring each child’s progress and providing nutrition and health counselling. The Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Foods are, where possible, made in their country of need using regional crops. This provides a double stimulus to the local economy, bringing empowerment and hope to the community. MSC and UNICEF have partnered to deliver Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Foods in crisis and emergency situations worldwide, saving almost 100,000 young lives to date.

ORGANISATION: UNICEF - United Nations Children’s Fund.

COUNTRIES: Least developed countries and countries in crisis and post-crisis situations.

PROJECT: Save children’s lives using Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Foods like Plumpy’Nut®. Therapeutic foods are complete dietary solutions used to treat severe malnutrition when ordinary foods would be ineffective or carry risks.

PRODUCT DESCRIPTION: Highly-fortified peanut-based complete food that’s ready to be eaten direct from the sachet without cooking or adding water, so it can be given to children in any situation.

AGES: From as young as 6 months old and up.

STRATEGY: Deliver Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Foods to children, supporting their families with medical monitoring plus nutrition and health counselling in their communities.

WHAT YOU CAN DO

TOGETHER WE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!

MSC is proud to support UNICEF in this life-changing programme, which is why we're inviting you on board, too. Because, wherever we live and whether we're parents or not, we all know the planet we share is in danger, and that children are the future and deserve the best.

WHAT YOU CAN DO
By donating just €1 (or USD 1.50), you'll help clean up the environment and transform the lives of children, women and their communities in Ivory Coast, giving them and indeed all of us hope for the future.

WHEN YOU WANT HELP MORE
There's no limit to how much you can donate if you'd like to give more. Every €1 you donate is like a brick building a brighter future. And everything you donate goes entirely and directly to this wonderful programme.

PLEASE DONATE NOW

WHAT WE ACHIEVED TOGETHER

10 million smiles and counting

We are proud to announce that, thanks to our guests' generosity, more than 10 million euro have already been raised around the world for life-changing UNICEF programmes since our "Get on board for children" partnership was launched in 2009.

During this period, MSC for UNICEF has saved some 100,000 children from severe acute malnutrition, many on the verge of death before treatment, contributed to eradicating malaria in Africa and helped children and adolescents go to school in Brazil.

None of this would have been possible without our guests, who — in giving together — have made this incredible difference, spreading their smiles of generosity worldwide.

I CAN BELIEVE

The new official song

MSC Cruises and UNICEF have launched a new song performed by an Italian children’s choir called “I Can Believe – MSC for UNICEF”, to provide a soundtrack to all UNICEF awareness raising efforts on board MSC Cruises ships. The song is played during the MSC for UNICEF kids parade on board each MSC Cruises’ ship, as part of the awareness raising efforts of MSC Cruises targeting children aboard its fleet and called UNICEF Day.