Corporate social responsibility:
NGOs speaking the corporate language View Presentation
The CSR Committee held a seminar on June 24 to discuss the topic “When NGOs speak the corporate language.” The seminar consisted of four sessions, each addressing a specific question to NGOs.
The first session posed the question, “Do you know what you want?” to NGOs. The speakers highlighted the challenges NGOs face, including the fact that corporations are difficult to reach and that they do not respond to proposals and correspondence sent by NGOs.
During the second session, “Do you know what they want?” representatives from the corporate sector shared their perspectives on how NGOs can approach corporations. They emphasized that sustainability is important when they are approached about supporting projects. They also pointed out that the proliferation of civil society organizations makes it difficult to distinguish which are serious and effective.
In the third session, which debated “How do you approach them?” Jennifer Bremer, associate professor of management at the American University in Cairo, outlined how NGOs can write a good proposal, emphasizing that they must: tell a story; help the reader to envision the program; be consistent and clear; generate confidence; and answer the reader’s questions.
The fourth session, “Do you know how to utilize resources efficiently?” highlighted that resources are not merely limited to funding. The most significant resource an NGO can rely on is human capital. The board of directors and the employees of an NGO are crucial to its success. Furthermore, each NGO needs to have a specific vision with set goals to enhance its performance and improve its relations with the corporate sector. With regard to financial matters, it was suggested that NGOs have separate accounts for every project. Also, documentation of all expenses is vital because it ensures accountability and transparency.
Businesses urged to push forward development
The CSR Committee held a meeting on February 4 on the topic, “Business solutions for human development: a call for action.” The speakers for this session were Laila Iskander, chairperson of CID Consulting, and Nahla Zeitoun, research and policy associate for UNDP Egypt.
Iskander opened the presentation citing Egypt’s current positive macroeconomic trends, including strong GDP growth. However, she went on to note that many contrasting indicators, such as high unemployment rates among youth, higher poverty rates and mushrooming informal settlements, are inhibiting the country’s development.
She cited a number of shortcomings in Egypt as contributing factors. For one, oversight is largely based on the voluntary compliance of companies. Iskander also mentioned the lack of government oversight for legal, labor and environmental regulations, and the inability of NGOs to access information for monitoring the social violations, such as pollution and labor abuse, of companies.
The speakers went on, however, to note that the Egyptian business sector is facing many constraints that prevent it from fully contributing to the country’s development. They listed some of these constraints, including restrictions on NGO networking and coalition building, a lack of knowledge concerning poverty issues and development goals, and the tendency of development efforts to be fragmented.
To reconcile such shortcomings, Zeitoun proposed “targeting while partnering,” where businesses support specific sectors and activities that complement their core business and provide learning programs linked to production, distribution and sourcing. She referenced this way of partnering as more effective than charitable blanket giving.
Additional suggestions included an emphasis on value chain accountability and partnering to add impetus to development initiative incentives for positive corporate action, publicizing and “professionalizing” NGO works, and establishing clear priorities for action on a country and local basis as well as engaging the government to understand, support and promote CSR.
The work of FEI and DANIDA View Presentation
The CSR Committee held a meeting on September 10 on the topic “FEI and DANIDA corporate social responsibility: programs for support and advancement.” The guest speakers were Amal Al Sheemy, representing the Federation of Egyptian Industries (FEI), and Mona Beckzada, representing DANIDA, the Danish international development agency.
Al Sheemy described the FEI’s structure and mission as “to drive industrial economic growth, both domestic and export, using an independent, proactive, self-sustainable and integrated approach to global competitiveness, while balancing the needs of... stakeholders.” She went on to further discuss the recent CSR objectives established by the FEI, including supporting the implementation of CSR strategies, influencing the Egyptian framework supporting the CSR activities of their members and participating in the development of the international CSR agenda.
The FEI’s corporate social responsibility program has only been fully operational for a short time, but has already established successful relationships and partnerships, she said. Current partners include the UNDP, Procter & Gamble and the Danish embassy.
Beckzada spoke about DANIDA’s Business-to-Business for Development (B2B), a private sector development initiative that seeks to establish long-term and mutually committed partnerships between Danish firms and companies in developing countries. By using business linkages as an instrument for economic growth, the B2B program seeks to improve living conditions for the people in these countries.
Current public-private partnerships in Egypt include code of conduct initiatives, one with a spinning and weaving company, and the other with a textile supplier. Both partnerships are helping to facilitate the implementation of internationally accepted environmental and ethical standards. DANIDA partnerships have also helped to facilitate multi-stakeholder relationships to raise awareness and provide treatment for people with diabetes and mental illness. And most recently, specifically under the B2B program, partnerships have been created with tourism and textile companies to improve working conditions, undertake environmental measures and conduct training courses.
The role of the SFD in Egypt
AmCham’s CSR Committee convened on July 17 to discuss the topic “Public-private partnerships for development: experience of the Social Fund for Development.” Guest speaker Hanaa El Hilaly, director general of the Social Fund for Development (SFD), outlined the organization’s role in social responsibility as well as some of the successes of the SFD’s projects.
The SFD is currently supporting small and microenterprise projects nationwide through the facilitation of LE 6 billion in loans. As many banks refrain from lending to the poor, the SFD fulfills its mission of poverty alleviation by participating in a collaborative guarantee model where the project’s credit company guarantees 80 percent of the loan, banks guarantee 10 percent, and the SFD guarantees the remaining 10 percent.
As a support mechanism for further empowering the “poorest of the poor,” the SFD is very involved in projects to improve infrastructure, build roads and bridges, undertake health and environmental projects, or otherwise improve the standard of living and economy in Egypt. The organization has established integrated service centers throughout Egypt, which act as “one-stop shops” to assist borrowers in licensing, El Hilaly said. It also supports business matchmaking and skills training, and recently established the Arab Union for Small & Micro Enterprises, which is an international consortium for collaboration and exchange of products. Fourteen companies have joined to date.
El Hilaly believes it is the duty of businesses to play a lead role in serving the poor communities of the environment in which they operate. Accordingly, the SFD includes the private sector as a key stakeholder in its organizational structure, and offers learning, training and capacity-building opportunities that companies can incorporate into their CSR activities. The SFD is reaching out to leading commercial companies, including P&G and Coca-Cola, to implement a multitude of social projects. The organization intends to expand this role of acting as a vehicle for CSR in Egypt.
Establishing foundations for CSR activities
On June 20, AmCham’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Committee hosted Noha Saad, corporate responsibility and foundation manager for Vodafone Egypt, and Dalia Abdel Kader, deputy general manager for Arab African International Bank (AAIB), to discuss the topic of “The role of private sector foundations in CSR.” The discussion focused on the benefits and challenges of private companies establishing foundations to carry out their charitable work.
Saad provided a brief overview of Vodafone Egypt’s experience in establishing a charitable foundation to carry out its community initiatives to improve health and education. In 2003, the mobile operator established a foundation registered with the Ministry of Social Solidarity that provides donations to NGOs to implement selected projects. The foundation has facilitated Vodafone’s CSR activities, but has also had its own unique set of challenges, which Saad related.
Abdel Kader, meanwhile, spoke about AAIB’s unique approach to CSR, which began when it embarked on an initiative to renovate Cairo University’s Specialized Pediatric Hospital. The project evolved into the creation of separate charitable foundation, known as “We Owe it to Egypt.” The foundation aims to mobilize large corporations to participate in activities that improve education and healthcare, she said.
Both speakers spoke of the merits and challenges of developing a foundation as a vehicle for charitable work in Egypt. The merits include the ability to focus wholly on sustainable programming and benefit from certain tax incentives, while one of the challenges is registering a corporate-affiliated charity. According to Saad, it took more than a year to register Vodafone’s foundation due to bureaucratic red tape.
In closing, the speakers agreed that the private sector in Egypt has the potential to make tremendous strides in improving and influencing the state of education and health, provided it is able to implement sustainable programs. Charitable foundations are one way in which this can be accomplished.
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