Transporting 100 donated surfboards to South Africa
At the ceremony
At the ceremony
TOKYO—Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd. (MOL) today announced that it will participate in the “Surf for Smile” project, as a consortium member of the international contribution program ”Sports for Tomorrow" (SFT). The project “Surf for Smile” is donating about 100 surfboards to the non-governmental organization Surfers Not Street Children from the Ichinomiya-cho Surfing Business Union in Japan. The project is an initiative aimed at helping youth in South Africa avoid drugs and violence by exposing them to the joy of surfing and make them live with full of smiles.   On May 27, a ceremony to present the surfboards was held at Tsurigasaki beach. This beach will be the surfing venue for the 2020 Olympics, the first time the sport has been included in the Olympic Games. The ceremony welcomed many guests including Japan Sports Agency Minister Daichi Suzuki, officials from the South African Embassy in Japan, and NGO staffs.  MOL will transport the donated surfboards to South Africa this summer as part of its cooperation in the SFT program. This is the second time MOL has pitched in to help SFT programs, following ocean transport of sporting goods to Ghana last year. MOL continually takes a proactive stance in social contribution activities that are unique to an ocean shipping company with a global network.