The UPS Foundation, the charitable arm of UPS, has announced five grants totalling more than $1million to support a variety of environmental programs and organizations worldwide.
The grants, which include funds for planting trees, conservation, youth education andvolunteerism, reflect the establishment of environmental stewardship as a new focus area of theFoundation.
The new grant awards include $300,000 to The Nature Conservancy, the leading globalconservation organization protecting ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people,to assist with tree-planting efforts in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil, conservation initiatives forrural residents in the Yunnan Forest in China and reforestation efforts in East Africa’s HighlandForest.
Another $300,000 are intended for the Earth Day Network reaching over 17,000 organizations in174 countries, to support its national civic engagement project to educate youth aboutenvironmental issues and provide teachers with lesson plans and environmental impact online tools.
A further $220,000 are meant for Keep America Beautiful (KAB), the nation’s largestvolunteer-based community action and education organization, to support its environmental educationinitiatives, including the creation of KAB affiliates on college campuses, support for a communityvolunteer initiative, a challenge grant for KAB affiliates and an environmental partnership grantfor UPS Global Volunteer Month to encourage employee participation.
The fourth grant of $200,000 is awarded to the National Park Foundation to fundyouth-engagement programs, including First Bloom, which provides children in urban locations withhands-on environmental learning.
In addition, The UPS Foundation provides $50,000 to the Arbor Day Foundation to plant onetree for each of the first 50,000 UPS customers to begin using UPS electronic billing solutions,which eliminate the need for paper invoices.
“Protecting the environment is increasingly important to our company, to our customers, ouremployees and the communities in which we operate around the world, so it is a natural fit for TheUPS Foundation,” said Lisa Hamilton, president of The UPS Foundation. “We are proud to partner witheach of these esteemed organizations and to support the important work of nurturing our planet.”
At the beginning of 2008, The UPS Foundation adopted a new global philanthropic strategy tostrengthen its impact and better leverage UPS’s capabilities. In addition to the new environmentalsustainability focus area, the Foundation’s other focus areas include community safety, non-profiteffectiveness, economic and global literacy and diversity.
