MICHAEL WIRTZ ECUADOR AWARD

[BIZ/GOV: Stolberg, APRIL 2]
Michael Wirtz, the Aachen businessman and president of the Aachen Chamber of Commerce, was created an officer in the National Service Order of Ecuador on March 30. This is the highest order that the South American country can give a private individual.

Mr Wirtz accepted the honor in a ceremony at Ecuador’s embassy in Berlin from the ambassador Horacio Sevilla Borja. Mr Wirtz is also the Honorary Consul for Ecuador in the North-Rhine Westphalia, for which he received the award in addition to his social and cultural projects in that country. The projects included a special nutritional center for undernourished and sick children.

Since 2005, the center has looked after 6,300 people including 1,600 children, and cases of malnutrition fell by 50%, with infant mortality down by 70%; tooth decay, which used to be a major problem, has also disappeared.

Mr Wirtz has also been active on the cultural front and has focused on publications and exhibitions of the work of the Ecuadorian artist Oswaldo Guayasam’n (1919-1999). There were exhibitions of this artist’s work in Gelsenkirchen, Potsdam and Zehdenick, with 120 original works. Mr Wirtz’s family business, Grünenthal, has been active in Ecuador for 34 years and this has become the Latin-American hub for the business.
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