Chamber of Industry launches the “Cold and Peace” initiative to support those affected by fires

Chamber of Industry of Damascus and its countryside launched today the “Cold and Peace” initiative to support those affected by the fires that hit a number of Syrian governorates, during a meeting at the Chamber’s headquarters with a number of committee heads, industrialists, merchants and representatives of NGOs.

Head of the Chamber of Industry of Damascus and its countryside, Samer Al-Dibs, said that the initiative aimed at supporting the families affected by the fires, which struck homes, crops and thousand of year forests. Our duty today is to provide all possible material and in-kind assistance with the participation of industrialists and merchants and all who want to donate.

Al-Dibs indicated that the collection of material aid started from the first hour of the campaign during the meeting, and the amount directly reached was 200 million Syrian pounds, and they are continuing to receive the aid. The specialized committees will collect material and in-kind donations, referring to a project of planting ten thousand trees which is proposed by an industrialist to start with it later.

Al-Dibs called on everyone to participate in the initiative to stand by our affected brothers in all regions as part of a wide scale and rapid campaign to deliver these materials to their beneficiaries.

Luay Nahlawi, Vice President of the Chamber, stated that they have started communicating with the main industrial sectors, and there are good financial donations in addition to in-kind quantities, especially foodstuffs from the first moments, noting that the volume of donations is expected to increase during the coming days to distribute aid to the beneficiaries.

Board member Talal Qala’ji stated that the food sector has donated large quantities of foodstuffs in addition to monetary amounts that will be placed at the disposal of the body that will distribute the materials to the affected families, stressing the necessity for all sectors to mobilize efforts to help families overcome this ordeal.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Internal Trade and Consumer Protection announced the opening of a checking account at the Syrian Commercial Bank in cooperation with the Federation of Syrian Chambers of Commerce under the name (Fire victim assistance). This step came as an implementation of the instructions of the Cabinet and within the framework of the measures taken by the Ministry of Internal Trade and Consumer Protection to help those affected by the fires that struck their lands and properties and to alleviate their suffering and the losses and damages they suffered,

A number of areas in Lattakia, Tartous and Homs governorates have witnessed during the past few days a number of fires that led to damage to forests, fruit trees and greenhouses, all of which were put out earlier Sunday.

Inas Abdulkareem