Standard Chartered to raise US$ 100 million by 2020 for eye-care

Standard Chartered Bank will raise US$ 100 million by 2020 to build sustainable eye-care services across Asia, Africa and the Middle East. The Bank will fundraise through Seeing is Believing – its global initiative in collaboration with the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) and leading international eye-care NGOs.

Standard Chartered is recognised globally as the single biggest corporate sponsor of avoidable blindness projects around the world. Seeing is Believing (SiB) is a major global public-private initiative to help address preventable blindness and was commenced and driven by Standard Chartered staff in 2003 as a way of celebrating the bank’s 150th anniversary.

To date US$ 37 million has been raised for eye-care initiatives impacting more than 25 million people, half of which has been donated by Standard Chartered through dollar-for-dollar matching.  The funding has covered over 2.7 million surgeries, training for over 58,000 health care workers, 3.4 million eye-care screenings, and the distribution of over 126,000 pairs of glasses.

Seeing is Believing focuses on providing poor, marginalised populations access to complete services from cataract surgery, to preventative treatment and specialised medical interventions. The bank aims to make a lasting impact by building sustainable eye-care programmes in developing countries in which it operates.

The International Agency for Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) has described the programme as a ‘trail blazer’ corporate social responsibility initiative: There are 39 million blind people in the world and without effective intervention the number of blind people worldwide is projected to increase to 76 million by 2020 (VISION 2020). 80 per cent of blindness can be avoided through early treatment or surgery. Standard Chartered will extend its commitment to Seeing is Believing, aiming to raise a further US$ 63 million by 2020.  

Anirvan Ghosh Dastidar, CEO, Standard Chartered Bank said: “It is estimated that blindness leads to losses in billions in economic productivity, as many blind and visually impaired people lack the opportunity to work or support their families. We are very proud of the contribution that the Seeing is Believing initiative is making to the communities in which we do business and we want to champion our employees’ commitment and demonstration of our brand promise ‘Here for Good.’”