Online opticians Glasses Direct selected ORBIS UK as its first charity partner. 

For its first project, the company will donate to ORBIS £1 for each pair of frames sold from its new "Colours" range. Glasses Direct expects to  raise thousands of pounds for ORBIS's rural eye care project in southern Ethiopia, with the money going toward the elimination of the painful and blinding infectious disease trachoma.

Glasses Direct founder and managing director James Murray Wells hopes the project will form the basis of a long-term relationship with ORBIS. Mr. Wells plans to visit the rural eye care project in Ethiopia at some point in 2008.

"This is a wonderful opportunity for the team at Glasses Direct and our customers to make a difference to eye care in less developed parts of the world," Mr. Wells said. "We have great hopes for the relationship with ORBIS, and through this charity we hope that we will go on to offer support to other countries as well as Ethiopia."