Unilever
Improving hygiene access for families
Unilever’s programme helps refugee children learn safe hygiene such as handwashing, and access soap.
©UNHCR/Antoine Tardy
Unilever’s support ensures more refugees can live with dignity through healthy hygiene habits and increased access to hygiene products, such as soap.
UNHCR first partnered with Unilever and the hygiene soap brand Lifebuoy in 2019, aiming to promote positive hygiene behaviours for Syrian refugees in Lebanon. To-date, our programme with Lifebuoy in Lebanon has reached almost 30,000 refugee mothers and children through Lifebuoy’s ‘Mum’s Magic Hands’ handwashing education and awareness program.
In May 2020, UK for UNHCR joined the Hygiene Behaviour Change Coalition, created and led by Unilever and the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO).
With the support of Unilever and FCDO, UNHCR was able to reduce exposure of millions of refugees and host community members to COVID-19 through increased hygiene promotion in Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, Bangladesh and Cameroon.
Most recently and in response to the Ukraine emergency in 2022, Unilever launched a global employee fundraising campaign, matched by the company, and donated just under one million personal hygiene products to refugees of the conflict.