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CHARITY | |
In essence, we at BalticShop.com are marketing the
Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian cultures, including centuries
long traditions in folklore, art, music, literature, crafts, etc.
Unfortunately, the three countries still have to recover from the Post-Soviet
economic crisis. Although the streets of downtown Tallinn, Riga,
Vilnius and Kaunas appear to be enjoying an economic boom, loaded
with luxury cars and their newly well-off owners spending
freely, once you get off the beaten tourist path you will
realize that the situation is quite different for the bottom
50-60% of population. Retirees, teachers, government workers,
and, especially children, are struggling. Population growth is negative.
In less than 10 years, the population has been split
between the haves and have nots. The increasing inequality in income distribution and subsequent
polarization of population is very disturbing. Many will tell you
although
they appreciate the freedom and independence, economically they are
a lot worse off now than they were 15 years ago and don't believe their
life is going to get better any time soon.
In the spirit of the holidays, we have decided to give back to the
communities where the BalticShop.com products come from. From now
on we will donate 1% of all www.balticshop.com online retail sales
to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania related charities. This means
that for every $100 spent on BalticShop.com purchases (less
shipping charges), we will donate $1 to charities.
Currently we
are researching the most effective way of using this money. We
will list different charity projects on this page, so you will be
able to learn more about various projects and needs.
We will list the current projects at the checkout so that our customers can choose to which charity
the 1 percent of their purchase is applied to.
Your recommendations and feedback are welcome.
Here are some Baltic related charities:
American Professional Partnership for Lithuanian Education—A.P.P.L.E.
http://www.applequest.org/index.html
American Latvian Association's Aid to Latvia program
http://www.alausa.org/aboutala.htm
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