Since our goal is to make the world a safer place, we have a clear strategy also for CSR, corporate social responsibility. We are determined to fight poverty by encouraging entrepreneurship.
One of the motives for Roxtec to work with CSR is to make a positive impact on society with our business. Roxtec supports local initiatives, educational projects and sports associations. We have business agreements with social companies in different countries to give disabled people work opportunities.
Sponsoring villages in India
We are also partnering with the non-profit organization Hand in Hand to fight poverty in rural India. As sponsor of the organization's Village Uplift Program we support improvements in five focus areas.
- Child labor elimination & school for drop-outs
- Self-Help Groups & microfinance for women
- Internet access & grass-root level democracy
- Health education & free medical examination
- Environmental solutions for waste & resources
Positive impact
The program provides help today, and self-help abilities for tomorrow. The women in the Self-Help Groups speak with one voice regarding the importance of their new family-based enterprises:
"Life is much better now – especially for our children."
Here are some results from our latest two-year collaboration project in Kurumbapatty in Tamil Nadu.
Education
- 1,495 people have attended awareness programs on child labor. The village is declared "Child friendly", which means that child labor is eliminated and that all children go to school.
- 165 people have attended computer courses and increased their possibilities to get jobs.
- 1,447 people have attended meetings on rights to information and grassroots democracy.
Health
- 3,429 people have attended awareness meetings and camps on health.
- 31 toilets have been constructed. The government will construct the rest of the toilets.
- 22 more women are out of anemia and 15 more children are out of malnourishment.
Empowerment
- All 264 women in the Self-Help Groups have attended training in enterprise development.
- 282 family-based companies have been created, many of them thanks to microfinance loans granted by Hand in Hand's loan institute. The recovery degree of these loans is 99,6%.
- 111 kitchen garden units and 59 azolla (protein-rich cattle feed) units have been promoted.
"It is wonderful to see how our contribution is used to enable a direct positive change for so many people. It is also great that the activities are performed in a long-term perspective and with ecology and sustainability in mind," says Ulrica Malmberg, Roxtec's Executive Vice President Human Resources.