BAT Comes a Long Way in Initiatives

Source from:  biz.thestar.com.my 09/03/2007

BRITISH American Tobacco (M) Bhd (BAT) expects its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) efforts to be treated with criticism and sceptism. According to corporate and legal affairs director Christine Lee, BAT understands that the process of being recognised as a responsible company in this industry is long and arduous. "What is crucial is that we continue our journey towards that end," she said in an email interview recently. Lee said BAT's CSR efforts were based on a set of business principles, which includes mutual benefit, product stewardship and good corporate conduct. BAT was also the first company to produce a social report following the AA1000 standards and the global reporting initiative guidelines since 2002, she said. Lee said BAT's initiatives had also led the company to be included in the Dow Jones sustainability indices world for five consecutive years. Unilever (M) Holdings Sdn Bhd said among the reasons why companies were hesitant to implement CSR-related activities, was the perceived costs involved. "Rather than considering it as an investment and a business strategy, it is often seen as a liability, hence a small budget is allocated for CSR," it said. Unilever's CSR initiatives are guided by its corporate purpose and code of business principles, which cover the social impact of its products, securing supplies of key raw materials and CSR benefits to its stakeholders and local communities. "With over two-thirds of our raw materials coming from agriculture, we make sure these materials are sourced in a sustainable manner." Maxis Communications Bhd head of corporate social responsibility Salmah Ahmad said the company had embarked on the Energy, Water and Communications Ministry -Maxis Cyberkids Programme to educate children in rural areas on Information, Communications and Technology and self-development skills. Salmah said the programme was in its fifth year and had reached out to more than 7,000 students and teachers. "Another effort is to upgrade rural telecommunications infrastructure, under the government's universal service provision (USP) initiative," she said. Last year, Maxis contributed RM306.6mil to help improve rural access, bringing its total contribution to the USP to over RM1.01bil. Salmah said the Maxis Developer Programme provided commercial platform to over 100 information communications and technology start-up firms. Since 2003, over RM12mil has been invested in the venture. Enditem