FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 19/10/06

Hand Prints for Poverty

If you come down to the zoo today you're in for a big surprise…

As children from all over Auckland are set to descend on Auckland Zoo this Labour weekend, New Zealand charity ChildFund will be launching its 'Give Us a Hand' campaign.

Children will be encouraged to donate their hand prints to raise awareness of children living in desperate poverty around the world. ChildFund is seeking to collect 5,000 handprints on a100m long fabric banner to demonstrate the number of children who die in any given four hour period because they were born into poverty. The ChildFund campaign hopes to raise awareness that a child somewhere in the world dies every three seconds from hunger and preventable disease, diseases which New Zealand parents would not consider life-threatening.

ChildFund managing director Paul Brown says " There is so much we can do to help those in poverty, something as simple as putting your hand on a piece of canvas will help raise awareness that 30,000 children die every day from hunger and preventable diseases. 10 million children a year." The event will run through Labour weekend, then on successive Sundays from November 5th. The banner will be unveiled on the 20th of November, Universal Children's day.

ChildFund works in over 54 countries worldwide and has helped over 11.4 million children and their families living in desperate poverty.

"New Zealanders are always willing to lend a hand and that is recognised by the high levels of child sponsorship", says Paul Brown The event has been organised by a group of Auckland University of Technology public relations students.

ENDS

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