The Quiksilver Foundation aids the earth’s communities  

The Quiksilver Foundation is a non-profit organization committed to benefiting and enhancing the quality of life for communities of boardriders across the world by supporting environmental, educational, health and youth-related projects. With offices in Europe, Australia and America, Quiksilver has the capability of touching people worldwide. Quiksilver has the vision of making a difference to community and environment through the Quiksilver Foundation.

Respect for the environment is becoming an important issue of everyday life.

Be it at the beach, in the mountains, or even in the streets, we owe it to ourselves to respect and carefully preserve that environment in which we live. Since 1999, Quiksilver Initiative, environment department of Quiksilver Europe, has been working on this : eco-design and environmental management, events to help raise awareness and partnership with several associations.

Since 2004, Quiksilver Foundation has enlarged our action field. With offices in Europe, Australia and America, Quiksilver has the capability of touching people worldwide. Quiksilver has the vision of making a difference to community and environment through the Quiksilver Foundation.

Coeur de Forêt

The “Cœur de Forêt”  (Forest Heart) association, has been setting up a global structure since its debuts in 2001, that plants trees and creates value from its fruits through fair trade commerce clusters. The target is to provide alternative financial incomes for the forests inhabitants by raising their traditional know-how in order to make a live tree more valuable than a cut tree.

Every project develops through the following:
1. Every planted tree will spend its first year in a nursery
2. It is then replanted in an area of in need communities (Brazil’s and Guyana’s Amazon, and Madagascar)
3. The community receives revenue for the plantation and production of fruit, nuts and oils of which it becomes the owner.

Those projects’ support comes from members of the public and corporate businesses adopting trees. Every tree adoption contributes both to re-forest some of earth’s most beautiful forests and the setup of fair trade clusters raising the value of the produce of those trees such as vegetable oil and essential oils.

 

Katiet children : photo courtesy Quiksilver Foundation

 

Quiksilver SurfAid Community Health Training Centre

Humanitarian aid organization SurfAid International has opened the first stage of the Quiksilver SurfAid Community Health Training Centre at Katiet, in the Mentawai Islands, off Indonesia’s West Sumatran coast.

Mentawai Vice-Head Yudas Sabaggalet, Quiksilver’s Bruce Raymond and SurfAid’s Dr Dave Jenkins officially open the Community Health Training Centre. The centre, which has been funded by the Quiksilver Foundation, has been designed by leading organic agriculturalist, Brendan Hoare.

In the worst Mentawai villages, up to 50 per cent of children will die from causes including acute respiratory infection, diarrhea, bad or unclean birthing and malaria. Underlying this, SurfAid research shows that up to 40 per cent of Mentawai children are malnourished and 60 per cent of mothers and children are anemic. The centre aims to help correct this situation.

SurfAid Founder and CEO, Dr. Dave Jenkins, said the opening of the centre was the culmination of a long and successful partnership with Quiksilver. “The Quiksilver Foundation has been supporting SurfAid’s relentless pursuit of cost effective results that create lasting change and break the cycle of poor health and health behaviors that have been part of Mentawai life for up to 5000 years,” he said.

“Quiksilver understands the need for real grassroots action and the centre provides a place for best practice and for training staff to take that practice far beyond Katiet and the Mentawai,” he said. “Our staff will teach the mums how to more efficiently grow highly nutritious food for themselves and their children. This is cutting edge, grassroots community development at the very edge of the planet.”

 

Peter Mel & Tom Carroll in ‘Movember’: photo Joli    
Movember - Changing the face of Men’s Health 

Movember (the month formerly known as November) is a charity event held during November each year. At the start of Movember guys register with a clean-shaven face. The Movember participants known as Mo Bro’s then have the remainder of the month to grow and groom their Mo (Australian slang for moustache) and along the way raise as much money and awareness about Prostate Cancer.

While growing a Mo (moustache) is left to the guys, Mo Sista’s (ladies who support their guys or love Mo’s!) form an important part of Movember by recruiting Mo Bros, helping to raise funds and attending the highly anticipated Gala Parties.

But it’s not all fun and games, so why the extreme behavior? Whichever way we look at it, men are far less healthy than women. The average life expectancy for men is many years less than females; up to seven years less! Prostate cancer is the most common non-skin cancer in the U.S.A with one in six American men developing the disease and 27,000 men dying of the disease every year.

Movember culminates at the end of the month at the Gala Parties. We had a great end of Movember Party at Quiksilver headquarters in Huntington Beach for our employees. Bob McKnight Quiksilver CEO, who also grew a moustache, thanked the Quiksilver Team aptly named team Mo Daddy (after Quiksilver driver/sit-down comedian).

The team consisted of 112 Mo Bro’s and Sista’s; executives, employees and sponsored athletes such as Kelly Slater and Peter Mel alike. Team Mo Daddy raised $48,000 in America making Team Mo Daddy the number 1 team in the USA!!! Go Team!! It was truly a global initiative with Quiksilver Australia having a team of 45 and raising $13,300 (USD) and Quiksilver Europe with a team of 28 raising $4,400 (USD), so globally we raised over $65,000! That is not including DC who also raised close to $50,000.

Our very own Brian Kearns was named the Man of Movember at the LA gala party! We also held our own awards at Quiksilver HQ, giving away a snowboard for the best Mo, a Tony Hawk autographed skate deck for the Lamo (worst Mo) as well as awards for team members that raised the most money. Andrew Akiyoshi raised close to $12,000 alone!! Well-done Andrew!!

Movember is very proud to be teaming with the Prostate Cancer Foundation [www.prostatecancerfoundation.org/ ] in the USA. For more information on Movember and to check out some great photo’s from the gala parties go to movember.com 

 

Bob McKnight in ‘Movember’  : photo Joli 

Open letter from Bob McKnight

For years, Quiksilver has been actively engaged in charitable activities, both locally and globally. Quiksilver recognizes the concept of corporate social responsibility and benevolence. We want our philanthropic work to have impact beyond what we do as one company and believe that we can do this by coordinating the support of other organizations and individuals. The Quiksilver Foundation was formed to bring all of Quiksilver’s charitable giving under one umbrella. The Foundation commenced activities as a 501(c)(3) private foundation in October of 2004.

Our Mission
The Quiksilver Foundation is a non-profit organization committed to benefiting and enhancing the quality of life for communities of boardriders across the world by supporting environmental, educational, health and youth-related projects.

Our Vision
With offices in Europe, Australia and America, Quiksilver has the capability of touching people worldwide. Quiksilver has the vision of making a difference to community and environment through the Quiksilver Foundation. The Quiksilver Foundation has a commitment to improving the quality of all our lives. 

We desire to benefit:
Local Communities, including schools, churches and local charities through support and outreach programs; Major special projects and organizations sharing our focus on children, education, science, oceans and the environment.
 
For nearly three decades, Quiksilver has been a leader in providing charitable support that has enabled boardriders’ communities around the world to benefit education, the environment, scientific research and a variety of related causes.

Today, the Quiksilver Foundation has been formed to continue the charitable endeavors of the company throughout the world. From its office at Quiksilver’s Headquarters in Huntington Beach, California, the Quiksilver Foundation is in coordination with the company’s global offices in Asia, Australia, Europe and across the world.

Through sharing a wide range of resources, the Quiksilver Foundation can enable community-based organizations with charitable support, research and science innovation. The Quiksilver Foundation recognizes that our communities and their environments have provided great benefits for boardriders across the globe; it is their desire to preserve and continue this benevolence for this generation and those to follow.  
  
The Quiksilver Foundation has a broad mission, or in other words, big dreams. Most foundations have only one aim or goal, however at Quiksilver we are a company that surf, skates, skis and boards, so you are going to find us in the ocean, on the mountain and in the streets. That is why our mission is broad, because we are an international company that works in every environment and as such we hold ourselves responsible guardians for them.

With just four years under our belt the Foundation has been very busy and was key to relief efforts after the Tsunami in Asia and Hurricane Katrina.

By supporting groups such as SurfAid International and The Sumba Foundation we are giving people in underprivileged countries a hand up not a hand out. These foundations are creating sustainable futures for many islands in Indonesia by building schools, wells, roads and educating the people about malaria prevention, proper nutrition and sanitary practices.

We foster youth initiatives to build the future of our sport as well as our community, country and world. QuikSCience in collaboration with USC and The Wrigley Ocean Institute continues to grow and encourage science education in our schools and inspire future generations of scientists.

The Crossing visiting the West Coast of the United States was a perfect forum for us to show the work we do with Reef Check, by providing berths for marine biologists in order for them to monitor the worlds oceans and reefs. We also hosted a fundraising event at the Ocean Institute in Dana Point, introducing the Southern Californian community to the Quiksilver Foundation and raising money for the Quiksilver Foundation and the Ocean Institute.

The support of health related charities such as Keep A Breast through our Roxy brand has also been a huge success, raising over $100,000 for breast cancer research.

All of the work of the Foundation could not happen without the support of our employees who have joined teams to walk or run to raise money and awareness for other foundations such as The Children’s Hospital of Orange County and The Susan G Komen Race for a Cure. They gave generously during the Tsunami disaster and for Hurricane Katrina relief, as well as for local initiatives during the holidays by donating gifts for The Make A Wish Foundation and The Someone Cares Soup Kitchen.

These are all only a small amount of the charities that we support. Quiksilver Australia and Europe both have local initiatives and in 2008 we look forward to growing these programs and creating more global initiatives.

Sincerely,

Robert McKnight
Chairman/CEO
Quiksilver Inc.

 

Lisa Andersen for Keep A Breast : photo Quiksilver Foundation

 
 
 

Francais

“The Quiksilver Foundation »  vous adresse tous ses voeux pour cette nouvelle année 2008.

En décembre 2007 , Quiksilver Foundation Europe , a établi un partnariat avec l’association « Cœur de Forêt ». Ainsi , joint aux vœux de fin d’année  de la Foundation, un certificat d’adoption d’arbre avec son point gps , a été envoyé à un grand nombre de destinataires  (partenaires et employés).

A cette occasion, nous avons le plaisir de vous faire parvenir un certificat de parrainage d’un arbre. Vous y trouverez indiqué la position GPS du terrain sur lequel il sera planté.

L’association « Cœur de Forêt » met en place une démarche globale, allant de la plantation d’arbres à la valorisation de leurs fruits au travers des filières de commerce équitable. L’objectif est de donner des alternatives financières aux Habitants de la Forêt en valorisant leur savoir-faire traditionnels et de rendre un arbre vivant plus intéressant financièrement qu’un arbre coupé. 

Chaque projet se déroule de la façon suivante :
1. Le plant d’arbre parrainé est cultivé en pépinière durant l’année en cours
2. Il est ensuite replanté sur un terrain par les membres d’une communauté défavorisée (Amazonie Brésilienne, Amazonie Guyanaise et Madagascar)
3. La communauté bénéficie d’un revenu pour la plantation et l’exploitation des fruits, graines, huiles obtenus dont elle devient propriétaire. 

 Ces projets sont soutenus grâce à l’adoption d’arbres par des particuliers et des entreprises. Chaque adoption d’arbre contribue, à la fois, au reboisement des plus belles forêts de la Terre et également à la mise en place des filières de commerce équitable valorisant les fruits des arbres adoptés: huiles végétales et huiles essentielles (www.coeurdeforet.com).

Le respect de l’environnement devient chaque jour une préoccupation plus importante.

Notamment lorsque cela affecte nos terrains de jeu. A la plage, à la montagne ou encore en ville, notre devoir est de respecter et préserver l’environnement dans lequel nous vivons. Depuis 1999, Quiksilver Initiative, pôle environnement de Quiksilver Europe, œuvre en ce sens notamment à travers l’éco-conception et le management environnemental, l’organisation d’événements de sensibilisation et des partenariats avec de nombreuses associations.

Depuis 2004, la fondation Quiksilver a étendu le rayon d’action. Nos bureaux en Europe, en Australie et en Amérique nous permettent de toucher les populations du monde entier. Quiksilver a pour ambition de changer les choses pour notre société et notre environnement à travers « Quiksilver Foundation ».

www.movember.com.
www.coeurdeforet.com
www.quiksilver-foundation.eu

Surfrider Foundation, SAS, Surf-Aid, Reef Check, 
    Coeur de Foret, Mountain Rider, Eurosima
         Supported by Quiksilver Foundation