Miniature tofu burgers, wild-garlic hot dogs and the unavoidable curry sausage were on the culinary list on 20th May 2010. Fast food in festival style can also be served ecologically correctly and for a good purpose.
Helping with fashion and music: This was the motto of this year”s Fashion Against Aids initiative launched by H&M and DAA for the third time in a row.
An anniversary that was duly celebrated with 300 invited guests and Sarah Walker on stage in the Rosenhöfe Yards in Berlin Mitte. Even the weather was suitable: Some 350 skirts, shirts and small items of the new collection were sold in the almost summery evening. The money made selling the items will be donated to HIV/AIDS prevention projects of the organisations DAA, YouthAIDS®, UNFPA and the MTV Staying Alive Foundation.
As early as in 2008, H&M and Designers Against AIDS (DAA) launched a joint fashion collection under the name Fashion Against AIDS (FAA). The objective of the collection was to raise young people”s awareness of HIV/AIDS and inform them in a suitable way that safe sex continues being extremely important considering the increasing number of infected individuals of this age group. So far, the FAA initiative has been able to collect a total of USD 4.3 million making the activities in various projects worldwide become ever more successful and colourful.
Shop & Think – an approach which elevates consumption to a different level and which organic caterer Select Catering is happy to support.
Up until today, the FAA initiative has collected a total of USD 4.2 million with the help of which various projects raising the awareness for HIV/AIDS among youth have been supported.
Designers Against AIDS DAA is a non-profit organisation that intends to inform young people about HIV/AIDS in an attractive fashion and wants to make clear that safe sex continues being important taking into account the rising number of infected people in this age group. DAA used the FAA donations for their first International HIV/AIDS Awareness Education Centre (IHAEC) which will be inaugurated in the summer of 2010. In this centre, international students are to be trained on the development and implementation of HIV/AIDS prevention projects in the cultural context using music, fashion and social media. Apart from supporting the IHAEC, the donations are also used for a number of DAA”s own HIV/AIDS education projects, among them a documentary in South Africa, an extension of “Models against AIDS” and the website of DAA as well as the distribution of condoms – and good advice – at music festivals.
YouthAIDS®
YouthAIDS® is an education and prevention programme run by the non-profit organisation PSI. With the help of the media, pop culture, music, theatre and sport, YouthAIDS® intends to put a halt to the spread of HIV/AIDS and reach 600 million young people in over 60 countries with their life-saving messages, products, services and aid. YouthAIDS® uses the donations of FAA to support a municipal youth centre in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, as well as to establish an HIV/AIDS and drug-prevention programme for teenagers who are at great risk in Yekaterinburg, Russia. The money earned with the FAA collection 2009 will also go to another project supported by YouthAIDS®, which has not yet been selected.
UNFPA
The United Nations Population Fund UNFPA is dedicated to health and equal rights for men, women and children. In 2000, UNFPA paved the way for the Youth Peer Education Network, Y-PEER, a network of peer-group education. In this global pilot initiative from youth to youth, young people work as Y-PEER advisors on sexual and reproductive health and rights, among them the fight against the spread of HIV/AIDS. They educate and train friends and members of their own network. Other youth support a greater participation of young people. The money donated by FAA supports Y-PEER programmes in Oman, Bahrain, Egypt and Turkey. The programmes focus on conveying information about HIV/AIDS by means of theatre performances, information campaigns with well-known public figures of the corresponding country and a website, from which one can download training material.
MTV Staying Alive Foundation
The Staying Alive Foundation (SAF) is committed to supporting young people who have the potential to set things in motion and bring about lasting changes in their social environment. SAF donates small sums of money to young people in whom they believe, whom they trust and who have special inspirational power.
All these young people have one thing in common: They all combat the spread of HIV/AIDS in their own social environment in an extremely creative and innovative way. Up until today, the foundation has raised USD 3 million with which it was able to support 193 projects in 50 countries. In 2010, the FAA donations will finance new aid projects of SAF.