OKD Foundation will sell ceramic carps to miners and proceeds will go to charity

Ostrava (3 December 2009) – On Friday, the OKD Foundation will officially start its first public collection. It will sell little ceramic carps, manufactured in the St. Alexander Charity’s workshop, to the employees of OKD and other companies. Proceeds will be distributed between the St. Barbara Civil Association, which takes care of miner’s orphans, and the “Child with Diabetes”, an Ostrava-based association, which takes care of children suffering from diabetes.

“The miners have already clubbed together to provide funds to the St. Barbara Civil Association, and the “Child with Diabetes” Association has been selected by both the employees and public through an Internet survey,” Blanka Týřová, the OKD Foundation Director explained the reason why out of hundreds of projects, supported by OKD in the past,  just these two Associations will be granted the Christmas collection proceeds.

In the individual mines and coking plants, the little ceramic carps will be sold at 30 CZK by volunteers – students of the Dakol private school, Petrovice, Karviná District. In other companies, such as Green Gas DPB, HBZS, OKD Doprava, RPG, the collection will be organized by their personnel themselves. On Friday, little carps in the form of Christmas decorations will also be available at public events held in the Karviná and Ostrava squares.

The organized collection will take place in OKD for the first time, and in spite of that, the donation represents a great tradition among the miners. The employees provide regular supports to the St. Barbara Civil Association by covering costs of education, leisure-time     activities and health care of children whose fathers died when working underground. This year, they have already clubbed together approximately CZK 200,000 at four pre-Christmas miner’s meetings.

Vladislav Sobol