Community Chest of Korea has seen its year-end and New Year’s donations reach an all-time high as it celebrated the end of its donation campaign on Tuesday.

The CCK said it raised a total of 254.1 billion won ($225 million) as of Jan. 30, surpassing its two-month goal of 218 billion won and breaking its 2010 record of 224.2 billion won.

The nationwide charity network conducts the annual donation drive named “Hope Sharing Campaign” from December to January.

The CCK’s giant “Thermometer of Love” peaked at 116.6 degrees, showing the level of donation collected since December.

“The Thermometer was able to top 100 degrees thanks to active participation by individuals and companies in the charity drive despite economic difficulty. We will do our best to further spread the charity culture through our local communities,” said CCK Chairman Lee Dong-geon.

Its local offices have collected a record amount of donations as well, with South Gyeongsang Province seeing its donation thermometer reach 154.1 degrees.

“Corporations have made large contributions, leading the charity drive to a successful end,” said a CCK official.

Big corporations, including Samsung and Hyundai Motor Group, made up the lion’s share of CCK donations with 72.2 percent.

Individual donations, accounting for 27.5 percent with 58.1 billion won, also increased as more philanthropists gave large sums and the number of petty donations via phone call doubled from 70,000 last year to 145,223 this year.

Since the charity began the campaign in 1999, it has collected more than 2.6 trillion won.

By Lee Woo-young
(wylee@heraldcorp.com)