Kirtilals develops and maintains traffic islands in several places in Coimbatore and in many major airports in south India. It now plans to develop greenery in some of the schools and colleges.
CRI Pumps has adopted 16 schools in Coimbatore and proposes to adopt 100 schools across the country, in partnership with its distributors. It works on infrastructure, teaching aids, sports, and health and hygiene in these schools.
CRI Pumps has invested in teaching aids at the Panchayat Union Middle School at Keeranatham.
The two are among the several CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) investments by businesses here.
“I have served in 10 districts so far. We need to appreciate the CSR activities done in Coimbatore. These are not just nominal efforts. It is beyond expectation,” remarks Collector K. Rajamani.
Be it in education, healthcare, environment, women empowerment, or water management, businesses and voluntary organisations in the city invest substantially to create infrastructure and, in many cases, maintain the facilities created. Some companies focus on specific verticals such as environment or education and some others work in areas surrounding their factories.
For all of them, the focus now is on sustainability.
“CSR is of two types. One is spending on sustainable models and another is philanthropy. In philanthropy it is just spending on a requirement and there are such needs,” points out Ravi Sam, chairman of the CSR, Affirmative Action, Sustainability sub-committee of CII - Southern Region.
For businesses to sustain their CSR projects, the involvement should be from the top down. “The whole culture of the organisation should be tuned in to the CSR activities. At the field-level, for the CSR projects to sustain, the government and the corporate companies should work together,” he adds.
“Sustainability is the most discussed topic on all CSR platforms. Every one does projects as CSR spending is a mandate. But we need models for sustaining the efforts taken. Every project should have a life time. There should be an exit strategy too,” says S. Raja, head of CSR programmes at CRI Pumps.
Manufacturing facilities are all located in rural or semi-urban areas where there is a gap in reach of government projects. So these companies have traditionally invested in schools, healthcare, water supply, etc in these areas. There are additional funding requirements when there are Natural calamities or new areas that need focus. The scope for CSR is also expanding with different areas opening up for private investments.
Companies have budgets for ongoing programmes and new projects in the focus areas, and also for emergencies. Contributors are willing to donate and develop infrastructure. Maintenance is the biggest challenge, says Mr. Raja.
One of the voluntary organisations in Coimbatore built toilets in schools in some of the rural areas of the district last year. While two or three schools have maintained these, some others do not even clean the toilets regularly. The local body has not provided water connections in some, points out one of the co-ordinators for this project.
Mr. Raja says continuous monitoring is a way to make the projects sustainable. “We hold meetings with all the stakeholders before we invest in a school. There is a sense of ownership then and people come forward to maintain the facilities created,” he says.
Large-scale successful CSR projects have all tapped the resources in the Government. The government and the businesses should work together, adds Mr. Ravi Sam.
The CII - Southern Region will look at sustainable development of panchayats and draft a blueprint for sustainable development in the region this year. There are over 12,000 panchayats in Tamil Nadu. It will not be possible to work in all the panchayats. But, details such as the areas in want of support, fields that are catered to by the Government agencies, etc can be documented. Even the Government needs such information to co-ordinate its programmes, he says.
CSR can only fill in the gaps and support social welfare programmes. It cannot replace the entire government programmes, says the head of an industrial association here.
Mr. Rajamani says he will convene a meeting of all the contributors and the government department officials in a month to discuss the CSR programmes.
The corporate companies have their service area and the departments have their requirements. These should be tied-up. Infrastructure needs are many in primary health centres, schools, Adi Dravida welfare hostels, libraries, and for the differently-abled. A team should be formed to co-ordinate and sustain the projects.
