Global Health through Hygiene Programme
In 2005 we brought together a team of experts from across the business to form our Global Health through Hygiene Programme (GHHP). The GHHP's aim is to co-ordinate and maximise the impact of our hygiene initiatives around the world. The programme takes successful initiatives from one brand or country and tailors them to address consumer hygiene needs elsewhere.
It operates as a cross-functional team led by our GHHP director on behalf of multi-category research. The GHHP's work plan and strategic direction are set by a steering group made up of managers from across our business, representing our regions, brand teams, communications and R&D.
The vision
Unilever has a long and successful history in making hygiene products like soap and home cleaning products. Through our brands we see ourselves playing an important role in contributing to improvements in hygiene among our consumers around the world.
We aim to do this by making the most of the geographic spread of our business and our brand portfolio and also by working in partnership with NGOs, academia and scientific bodies to maximise the effectiveness of our programmes. Our aim is to put in place cost-effective hygiene campaigns that improve hygiene habits, in particular among the world's poorest people.
Implementing our vision
The GHHP is Unilever's one-stop shop for hygiene awareness and authority as it spans the full range of our hygiene brands and activities around the world.
Particular brands lead specific hygiene activities. Unilever brands, such as Lifebuoy soap, Pepsodent toothpaste and Domestos household cleaner, have been implementing hygiene awareness and education programmes for many years. These range from Lifebuoy's Swasthya Chetna rural hygiene awareness programme in India to Domestos' Hygiene for Health campaign in conjunction with the Red Cross.
Each hygiene awareness campaign has different approaches, audiences and ways of engaging with consumers' emotions in relation to hygiene. The GHHP's role is to identify good examples of health and hygiene programmes from around Unilever and enable others in the company to learn from them and adapt them for their own markets.
The GHHP also co-ordinates our work with international partners such as the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and the International Scientific Forum on Home Hygiene. We work with these partners on issues such as water, sanitation and hygiene. Projects often focus on finding ways of measuring and evaluating the difference that hygiene campaigns can make in changing people's behaviour.
