Children
WACKER supports “Die Arche” (The Ark; German-language website only), a Munich-based Christian charity for the young. The initiative, which works with children and young people from socially disadvantaged families, provides children with hot meals and extra tutoring, organizes leisure activities and offers counseling. WACKER continued to support The Ark in 2019 and 2020, donating €100,000 to the charity’s Munich branch in each case. We have supported the work of The Ark with annual donations in this amount for fourteen years.
WACKER’s commitment to The Ark goes beyond financial contributions – its employees also spend their free time as volunteers at the annual Ark Summer Festival, which was canceled in 2020 due to the pandemic. During the coronavirus pandemic, the charity’s Munich team delivered groceries and hygiene kits to needy families.
Exceptional Support in Exceptional Times
2020 was not only a tough year for the economy. Charitable institutions have been especially hard hit by the pandemic. Many aid organizations have seen donations diminish. The charitable organizations whose educational programs for children and youngsters WACKER has supported for many years are facing formidable challenges since the outbreak of the pandemic.
That’s why WACKER made special donations totaling €200,000 in 2020 to organizations that help children and young people. The children’s charity The Ark in Munich’s Moosach district and the Munich-based “SchlaU school” (website available in German only), which offers educational programs to young refugees, each received €50,000. €100,000 will go to the WACKER relief fund (WACKER HILFSFONDS) for its partner schools in Nepal, Haiti and Kosgoda.
WACKER HELP in China
WACKER’s support for children and young people extends to its sites outside Germany. For example, WACKER Greater China’s relief organization WACKER HELP supports a children’s home in Shanghai. Our employees volunteer there to improve the educational opportunities of disadvantaged children. The volunteers run campaigns to stimulate, for example, the children’s interest in reading, support the library, supervise painting lessons or show the children handicrafts.
A new project set up in the reporting period benefits children from Youyang County in southwest China. Here, WACKER HELP promotes the education of three- to six-year-olds in a structurally disadvantaged rural district and uses employee donations to fund a teacher’s salary, among other things.
WACKER Brazil
Wacker Química do Brasil regularly supports local community projects in Brazil, including corporate volunteering projects for childcare facilities. During the pandemic, our Brazilian subsidiary supported several nonprofit institutions with, for example, in-kind and food donations.