Helen Keller International Announces Commitment at Clinton Global Initiative

New York, September 28, 2007 – Kathy Spahn, President and CEO of Helen Keller International (HKI), participated in the third annual meeting for the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) in New York City. Conceived of by former President Bill Clinton, CGI brings together a diverse group of global leaders to devise and implement innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges.

This year, HKI committed to two initiatives, both of which aim to improve nutritional status and avert associated morbidity and mortality by fortifying food with essential vitamins and minerals – one through the distribution of an in-home supplement, and the other by fortifying commercial staple foods.

In India, anemia continues to be the country’s most prevalent public health problem. It is estimated that 75% of children under 5 years of age in India are iron-deficient. To address this problem, HKI is partnering with the H.J. Heinz Company to commit to the Sprinkles® for Rural India initiative.

Working closely with the India Ministry of Health, HKI, Heinz, and other partners are developing sustainable, large-scale distribution of a multi-micronutrient called Sprinkles® -- a tasteless dry powder presented in single-serve packages, or sachets, that can be stirred into any food after it is cooked and before it is served. The powder does not change the appearance, taste or texture of food, does not require special measuring or handling, and is resistant to humidity – all of which encourage regular use.

HKI will conduct a social marketing campaign to educate the local population and train the partners who will actually distribute the sachets. The project’s pilot phase is taking place in the state of Maharashtra, and, based on its anticipated success, will provide a model for other states to help catalyze a national effort to fight iron-deficiency anemia.

The project aims to benefit more than six million children. Tammy Aupperle, Director of the Heinz Company Foundation, joined HKI for the commitment announcement.

Deficiencies in essential vitamins and minerals (VMDs), such as vitamin A and iron, are major causes of premature death, disability and reduced work capacity throughout the world. VMDs, in fact, account for 10% of the global health burden. In West Africa, HKI has been at the forefront of building public/private partnerships to promote micronutrient fortification of processed food staples and condiments as a sustainable strategy to address VMDs.

HKI collaborates with a strong, regional economic community, the Monetary and Economic Union of West Africa (known by the French acronym UEMOA), and has built a partnership with the professional association of the cooking oil producers in the UEMOA zone (AIFO-UEMOA). Together, HKI and AIFO-UEMOA are committing to the Fortify West Africa initiative that aims to reduce maternal and child morbidity and mortality by reaching 70% of the population with fortified foods by 2010.

This commitment builds on an existing regional program to fortify cooking oil with vitamin A that has already started in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, and Mali, and will soon begin in the other five UEMOA countries. HKI is capitalizing on this momentum by developing a complementary strategy to accelerate mandatory fortification of centrally-processed cereal flours in the region, a process that has recently accelerated thanks to a significant pledge of support from the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation.

Cooking oil and wheat flour are excellent vehicles for fortification with vitamin A (cooking oil) and iron (wheat flour). They are both centrally processed in most countries in the region, providing an entry point for the fortification to take place. Cooking oil has been proven to be the easiest food vehicle to fortify with vitamin A, and numerous studies have shown it has a high level of market penetration in West Africa. Wheat flour is a good vehicle because it is widely consumed on a daily basis in many forms, and fortification has minimal to no perceptible effect on taste and texture. HKI is also embarking on a campaign to promote wide consumption of these foods by those at risk.

HKI was honored to have M. Angora Tano, President of AIFO-UEMOA and Chairman of PALMCI, a major oil-producing company located in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, join HKI for the meeting. His participation reinforced the powerful potential of the Fortify West Africa joint commitment to create a sustainable solution to VMDs for the people of West Africa.

CGI’s annual meeting attracted current and former heads-of-state, CEOs, media representatives, religious leaders, philanthropists, and NGO and foundation executives, including the Presidents of Afghanistan, Colombia, Finland, Malawi and the Philippines; corporate CEOs from Cisco, Google,  Starbucks,  Standard Chartered Bank and Wal-Mart; journalists Tom Brokaw and Nicholas Kristof; Archbishop Desmond Tutu; athletes Andre Agassi and Dikembe Mutombo; movie stars Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt; and Nobel Prize Winner Muhammad Yunus of Grameen Bank, among others.

Each participant makes a programmatic commitment to be accomplished within a specified time frame in one of the four focus areas – Global Health, Education, Energy and Climate Change, and Poverty Alleviation.

During the closing plenary session of the meeting, Tom Kalil, head of CGI’s Global Health track, cited HKI’s Fortify West Africa commitment as one that typified the spirit of CGI – an innovative partnership that is implementing a practical solution to a pressing global health problem.