Manpower Supports World Refugee Day

Manpower Inc. Draws Attention to Plight of Uprooted People as World Refugee Day is Marked Around the Globe

18 June 2010

Manpower Inc. (NYSE: MAN) is a corporate partner of World Refugee Day on Sunday, 20 June, which is organised by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). This year, the theme is “Home,” in recognition of the plight of more than 40 million uprooted people around the world. 

“Voluntary repatriations for refugees are at their lowest level in 20 years as conflicts around the world have grown more resilient,” said David Arkless, Manpower Inc. President of Corporate and Government Affairs. “Most of the time, refugees would like to return to their homelands, but where that is not possible there needs to be strategies in place to align refugees with the labour market needs in their new hometowns so they can integrate successfully instead of being socially excluded.” 

The slogan to accompany the theme is, “They Took My Home But They Can’t Take My Future,” which was chosen to highlight the need to ensure that refugees who cannot return to their home countries are given access to skills and education so that their lives and dignity are not put on hold while solutions are sought.

Manpower has engaged in several partnerships with the UNHCR and was one of the founding partners in the ninemillion.org campaign, which is focused on providing education to the nine million refugee children who are living long term in refugee camps around the world without access to adequate schooling to provide them with the skills they will need when they are eventually repatriated.

In Thailand, Manpower is working with Myanmar refugees to equip them with the skills they need to find work in the United States and build productive new lives. Refugees will link up with Manpower offices in their new homeland for continuing counselling and advice on how to find and retain a job.

“We need to provide more support for education and other essential life skills so even if refugees have lost their homes, they haven’t lost their futures,” added Arkless. “With voluntary repatriation opportunities currently limited, the importance of refugees being able to integrate locally and resettle to third countries is commensurately greater.”

Arkless spoke today at a special awareness day that took place in the Principality of Monaco, in the presence of H.R.H. the Princess of Hannover, on the indispensable alliance of public/private partnerships in order to meet the needs of displaced peoples by providing the expertise that the private sector has to offer.

“We recognise that people do not choose to be refugees and that there is a potential to be unleashed in everyone,” said Arkless. “That’s why Manpower is dedicated to unleashing the potential of refugees, who are intelligent and motivated, and willing and eager to rebuild their lives if they are given the opportunity.”

About the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
The UNHCR was established on December 14, 1950 by the United Nations General Assembly. The agency is mandated to lead and coordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide. Its primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country. It also has a mandate to help stateless people. In more than five decades, the agency has helped people restart their lives. It is twice the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1954 and 1981. Today, a staff of some 6,600 people in more than 110 countries continues to help about 34 million persons. http://www.unhcr.org


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