Helping the refugees from Ukraine

In March 2022 the Fondation Air Liquide launched its programme  to help refugees from the war in Ukraine with 2 objectives in mind:

• support local initiatives that are quick and effective.
• make sure the funds are well spent, by selecting each project and following it right to the end.

We decided to work mostly with small & mid-sized charities, counting on local Air Liquide employees. We offered €10-25,000 grants, with possible “repeat projects”.

16 months after the programme was launched, the Foundation has supported 46 projects in 7 countries, benefiting an est. 70,000 people. 22 of these projects are closed; 24 are ongoing.

There are 2 types of projects:

• Daily support services (i.e. education, psychological help, job-search support, social services, permanent accommodation, …): 30 projects benefiting an est. 18,000 people, mainly in Poland & Germany.
• Emergency & medical supplies: 16 projects benefiting an est. 53,000  people, mainly at the start of the programme (Spring of 2022).

We had a great response from Air Liquide employees from Day 1.

Every grant has been enabled by Air Liquide employees who have either:

• brought the projects to our attention
• been in charge of evaluating projects, then of making sure they deliver
• organized the programme in their operation
• or volunteered time to projects  

The backing of over 1,000 donors* ( gifting > €200,000) strengthened our sense of purpose and our responsibility to deliver effectively.

We are hugely grateful for their support.

With this in mind, feedback has been regularly given to donors and the Foundation’s total operating costs have been kept low, so that 95% of resources go directly to projects.

We have reached our targets of both responding fast (with response time for some projects down to a couple of weeks from charity-identification to 1st grant) and of making sure the funding is used effectively (thanks to the process of vetting charities and projects, and checking their implementation). 

Most of the refugees’ needs are now being taken over by public services … or directly by themselves. We are however monitoring the situation and currently backing 1-2 new projects a month.

Our warmest thanks go to all Air Liquide employees who have been contributing so much of their time, heart and energy, to Air Liquide SA, our financial sponsor who stepped in from the start, and to all our donors who responded so quickly and generously to our appeal. 

If you are an employee of the Air Liquide Group

You can contribute to support our work in favour of Ukraine's war refugees by recommending a project, or by supporting a project that we've selected. More information is available here.

If you have questions or remarks, use our dedicated contact form.