Group Management Report Products Safety and Health Environment Human Resources Social Commitment Consolidated Financial Statements 105
Worldwide Donation Campaign
The year 2020 presented the global community with challenging
tasks, some of which were existential. In this exceptional
situation, ALTANA decided to provide assistance
beyond its own sites and independently of its actual focus
on education, science, and research. Together with Aktion
Deutschland Hilft e. V., a strong alliance of German aid organizations,
we identified three projects, in Bangladesh,
Malawi, and Yemen, which support people particularly affected
by the coronavirus pandemic.
In the world’s largest refugee camp in Bangladesh,
more than 850,000 Rohingya forced out of Myanmar live in
extremely difficult hygienic and cramped conditions. The
necessary isolation of people suffering from COVID-19 is
hardly feasible here. The project of the aid organization
CARE that was selected aims to protect 65,000 particularly
vulnerable people from being infected with the coronavirus
and other diseases; to improve their medical care, drinking
water supply, hygiene, and nutrition; and to provide girls
and women with lasting protection against violence, sexual
abuse, and the emerging human trafficking.
In Yemen, 24 million people are now dependent on
survival aid. Ten million of them are suffering from acute
hunger, most of them children. The health system there had
already collapsed before the coronavirus pandemic. The
project of the aid organization CARE selected aims to protect
400,000 particularly vulnerable people in Yemen against
infection with the coronavirus and other diseases and to sustainably
improve their medical care, drinking water supply,
hygiene, and nutrition. The goal is to reduce the scale of
the disaster by taking precautions for as many people as
possible.
In Malawi (Southeast Africa), all schools were closed
due to the coronavirus pandemic. A prerequisite for reopening
them is a functioning hygiene concept. But many elementary
schools in Malawi do not even have access to clean
water. The objective of the project of the aid organization
Habitat for Humanity that was chosen is to make it possible
for some 3,000 students to attend school safely. In addition,
the hygiene measures serve to reduce contagious diseases
such as tuberculosis and diphtheria in the long term.
ALTANA allocated a total of 50,000 euros to these initiatives
and enabled its employees and business contacts to
participate online in deciding how the sum should be divided
among the three projects. ALTANA’s website provided all
the relevant information on a special page. Furthermore, in
an electronic Christmas card for 2020, the ALTANA Group
called on its employees and business partners to make their
own donations, thus increasing the amount donated. By
December 31, 2020, an additional sum of more than 30,000
euros had been collected in this way. ALTANA would like
to express its sincere thanks to all donors for their contributions.
Social Commitment and Other Donations
The coronavirus pandemic also had an impact on other
social commitment endeavors. ELANTAS Beck India supports
projects that focus on education, health, and hygiene,
and did so even before 2014, when companies in India were
legally obligated to assume responsibility for society. On
top of that, the company has always helped when there were
natural disasters in the country. In 2020, India was hit
particularly hard: In addition to the ever-changing pandemic
situation, natural hazards such as cyclones and floods victimized
the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat. This presented
ELANTAS Beck India with the difficult task of deciding
which of the many coronavirus relief projects the company
should support. Ultimately, it opted for two broad-based
emergency relief and disaster funds.
Despite pandemic-related interruptions, many educational
programs in India could be offered online. As part of