Finnish Red Cross Hunger Day collection breaks record

                 Collections during last month's Red Cross Hunger Day were the most ever raised in the fundraising event's history. So far the residents of Finland donated some 3.8 million euros, or about 1.6 million euros more than last year.

               The Finnish Red Cross Hunger Day collection has raised record amounts this year. About 3.8 million euros has already been collected. Contributions from private households increased by one million euros compared with last year. Corporate donations skyrocketed from 20,000 euros in 2014 to 600,000 euros this year.

Migrant crisis increased donations

             Fundraising coordinator at the Finnish Red Cross Regina Laurén says that the increase in generosity was prompted by the European refugee crisis.

She says that in prior years the business sector was not very interested in participating in the annual Hunger Day fundraisers because collected money goes to disaster zones, not towards earmarked projects.

"Companies usually donate more when there’s a natural disaster or something similar, and often companies aren’t interested in an [affected] country," Laurén says.

"But this year companies have donated a lot of money," she says happily.

Big increase in corporate donations

           The largest corporate donor requested to remain anonymous and gave 200,000 euros to the Red Cross.

           The second biggest corporate donation of 100,000 euros came from a newly-created foundation called the Me-säätiö (roughly translated to The Us Foundation), created by the founders of the mobile gaming company Supercell, Ilkka Paananen and Mikko Kodisoja.

"The foundation’s aim is to support children, young people and families and to reduce the risk of exclusion," the foundation’s executive director Ulla Nord says. “We wanted to give a larger sum to help alleviate the refugee crisis."

         Quite a few companies donated between 10,000 and 20,000 euros, like the organisers of the Helsinki music festival Flow, who say that the donations aren’t only about helping people, but about making a statement to the rest of the world.

        "We want to show what we stand for and say that people in need are welcome in Europe and in Finland,” the festival’s managing director Suvi Kallio says, adding that she hopes their donation prompts others to donate, as well.

Organisation director at the Red Cross, Marita Salo says that the donations help to maintain aid preparedness and reception unit volunteer activities.

"Volunteers also help authorities in integrating asylum seekers into Finnish society as quickly as possible," Salo says.

Hunger Day donations are still welcome at the Finnish Red Cross until the end of October.

 

Yle Finland