The airline helped raise nearly HK$12 million last year, a record amount, and more than HK$100 million since the project was launched two decades ago.

The money is sorted by volunteers three times a week at the Unicef headquarters in Happy Valley.

Dozens of tins labelled with the names of different countries are spread out on a table with about 10 volunteers working at a time to sort out the money.

Sometimes when they come across a particularly big donation a big cheer goes up. Apart from money, the envelopes can also include other items such as sweets, buttons, gold coins and rings. Once they even found a Bible in a collection bag.

Lorraine Tsang Lok-yan, senior fund-raising manager for Unicef, said if a donor wrote clearly on the envelopes that they wanted to donate the items, they would sell the items and donate the money. Otherwise, the items would be kept at the headquarters for a year, in case the owner wanted to claim them back.

In recent years, the three currencies most received were the Hong Kong dollar, yuan and US dollar. The appeal also brought in currencies from countries such as Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and even legacy money from South Korea.

Melissa Fung Chi-man, 11, a Primary Six pupil, finds the voluntary work fun. She likes to collect foreign currencies and would fight her sister for them when her father brought some home after trips. 'I am happier here to see so many different currencies than to fight for them against my sister at home,' she said.

Dragonair, Cathay Pacific's sister airline, helped in Change for Good's special appeal last year to raise money for victims of the Qinghai earthquake. Tsang said they were looking at the possibility of extending the regular appeal to the airline. They would also try co-operating with hotels and companies where staff made many trips.

Fund-raiser

Last year, Cathay Pacific helped raise this much, in HK dollars, for the Change for Good programme: $12m