Playing our part: how the lead and lead battery industries are supporting communities in the face of COVID-19
Our industry along with businesses across the world are facing unprecedented challenges amid the COVID-19 crisis. Many of our companies are working to maintain as much business continuity as possible, keeping vital products supplied and services operating, and supporting employees and their families.
It is humbling to see ILA members and battery sectors worldwide making a difference and helping with the response effort. From providing funding to communities and healthcare facilities, to donating and making personal protective equipment and other safety products for nearby healthcare workers, among others.
Canada’s Teck has created a $20M COVID- 19 response fund to support critical social initiatives and increase healthcare capacity, procuring one million masks to be donated for healthcare in British Columbia. And Glencore has launched the Glencore Community Support Fund, allocating $25 million to support COVID-19 relief efforts for local health authorities and community organisations. Meanwhile, in France, European specialist recycler Recylex Group has donated safety equipment stock to the Villefranche hospital.
In Poland, new ILA member KGHM Polska Miedź S.A. has donated thousands of litres of disinfectant liquid to hospitals and battery manufacturer GS Yuasa is supplying Uninterruptible Power Supply System batteries to NHS Nightingale hospitals and other key medical projects throughout the UK.
Lead battery, metal and motor sectors are further leading in their mobilisation to support communities during this pandemic. Battery company, Exide Technologies in the U.S. has donated cases of gloves, smocks, and shoe covers to a care and rehabilitation centre. Exide teams in Manchester, Iowa and Salina, Kansas have donated respirators, masks and hand sanitisers to local healthcare authorities.
And the effort is global, with Moura Group in Brazil altering their production lines to make 50,000 face shield masks to be donated to health professionals.
In the uncertain times we find ourselves facing it’s good to know that businesses, which are so often the cornerstones of the communities they service and the value chains they support, are playing their part in the worldwide effort to overcome the problems caused by COVID-19. It is vital that governments, businesses and employees work together to first and foremost protect people and their wellbeing and then ensure that economies can recover as quickly and as safely as possible.
