Golf tournament near Moscow

The 8th annual golf tournament will take place in Nakhabino, near Moscow, on June 7, Friday.

The tournament is organised by the McDonald's company in Russia and sponsored by Nestle Food ltd. and Coca-Cola Export Corporation.

Over 30 teams are expected to take part in the event, Russia's McDonald's reported. The organisers hope to crop more than $160,000, which will be donated to the Ronald McDonald's Centre in Krylatskoye. This sport-entertainment Centre was set up in 1996. It works much with mentally or physically handicapped children. There is a sports hall, mini-football, tennis, basketball playing fields, rowing classes, a health track, artificial golf greens, computer and music classes there. A group of children trained by the coaches of the Centre attend the Moscow golf club. The Centre is also visited by boys and girls from more than 40 rehabilitation centres and boarding schools. Every day some 2,000 children are engaged here for free.

The McDonald's company in Russia takes an active part in charitable work. On January 1990, when the first McDonald's restaurant in the country opened at Pushkin Square in Moscow, a tradition to render a part of the money, gained on the opening day of a new restaurant, to local children's institutions was born. The tradition is observed every time a new restaurant opens. Currently, 76 McDonald's restaurants function in 25 Russian towns, they serve over 200,000 people daily.

For the recent years the company has allocated more than $4.5 mln for sustaining charitable programs in Russia.

The company's charitable activities are highly estimated by the capital's authorities.