12.22.2002 ET

(CSRwire) NEW YORK – The NetAid Foundation and the international processing and packaging company Tetra Pak today announced the establishment of a partnership that will create opportunities for some of the world’s most disadvantaged children. Through the NetAid World Schoolhouse, an initiative designed to make quality education a reality for extremely poor children in the developing world, Tetra Pak will fund projects in rural areas of Pakistan and Colombia. Tetra Pak’s commitment of over $200,000 to these efforts marks the company’s first engagement with NetAid.

“We are very pleased to welcome this global leader into our family of corporate supporters,” says David Morrison, President of NetAid. “Tetra Pak’s support of these two projects in Pakistan and Colombia illustrates its dedication to the cause of educating the world’s rural poor and providing them with opportunities.”

Today’s public announcement was preceded by an internal announcement to over 700 Tetra Pak senior managers on December 13th. “Tetra Pak was looking for a partner who would help us to connect with reliable and efficient projects that make a true difference in people’s lives. NetAid has provided this critical link,” explains Nick Shreiber, CEO of Tetra Pak. Tetra Pak is particularly interested in efforts to educate children in rural areas of developing countries. These areas are often dislocated communities where poverty tends to be particularly acute and social services are lacking.

Tetra Pak will initially fund two projects of the NetAid World Schoolhouse in Pakistan and Colombia, countries in which the company has operations. The Pakistan project, run by the local development agency Indus Resource Center (IRC), focuses on girls’ education in the rural Dadu District. There and throughout Pakistan, girls often do not have access to education. The resultant 22.5 percent literacy rate for girls (compared to 48.7 percent for boys) has created a major hurdle for social change and economic development. The project will utilize a combination of non-formal education centers, formal government schools, and micro-credit schemes to enroll 750 girls in school. Tetra Pak’s commitment for this project is $149,995.

The Colombian project was conceptualized and will be managed by Coopération Internationale pour les Equilibres Locaux (CIELO), and represents a commitment of $40,000. This project will reach out to rural, at-risk children by constructing toy libraries and promoting play activities that bolster children’s development potential and help to ensure that at least 3,000 children will go to school.

Tetra Pak will also support costs related to the screening, selection, monitoring and evaluation of the projects in Pakistan and Colombia.

The two projects are part of a larger portfolio of education projects funded by the NetAid World Schoolhouse. Village by village and community by community, NetAid is providing the world’s poorest children with a chance to learn and gain the benefits of health, prosperity and stability afforded by education. Thus far, the NetAid World Schoolhouse has affected the lives of almost 73,000 children.

About NetAid
NetAid is an independent non-profit organization (501 c3) based in New York. NetAid works to build an active network of people and organizations committed to ending extreme poverty around the world. The NetAid World Schoolhouse is the organization’s flagship initiative, designed to make education a reality for the poorest children in developing countries. Through the World Schoolhouse, NetAid connects corporations and other supporters around the world with quality education projects that have methodologies proven to deliver measurable, sustainable results. NetAid was founded in 1999 by Cisco Systems and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

About Tetra Pak
Tetra Pak has more than 20,000 employees, and operates worldwide. Products in Tetra Pak packages are sold in more than 165 countries and the company has 77 sales and marketing offices. Net sales amounted 2001, MEUR 7,650. Tetra Pak is the only international company in the world able to provide integrated processing, packaging, and distribution line and plant solutions for liquid food manufacturing. Visit www.tetrapak.com.