India is home to some of the richest people on the earth, and ironically, it is also home to the poorest of the poor as well.
According to the Brookings report, about a decade ago, India had approximately 73 million people who were living in extreme poverty. Extreme poverty equates to a severe lack of access to even basic livelihood like proper shelter, good food, clean water, sanitation, healthcare, education, etc.
However, the Indian government over the years has taken great strides in pulling out literally millions of Indians out of poverty. From 54.7% in 2005, they helped reduce it to 17% in 2020.
Yet there is still a long way to go, and they cannot do this by themselves.
Indian organisations have definitely pitched in and have been addressing various livelihood issues relentlessly. According to an analysis published by CRISIL Foundation, the main focus for many companies in the past year was on improving education, healthcare and livelihoods. In fact, these accounted for 75% of the total spend on CSR. In the financial year 2019-20, in terms of both, number of companies spending (1,030) and proportion of total spend went up to 36.16% from 35.03% of the previous year.
Here are some of the issues that require more support.
Restoring livelihoods
In an increasingly crowded world, some kind of disaster is always around the corner. Earthquakes, cyclones, floods, forest fires, pandemic, you name it, we’ve seen it all in barely last 5 years. Any kind of disaster always strikes the poor in the worst possible way, destroying their meagre livelihood. That’s why having a committed project that aims at restoring some dignity back into their lives is important.
Aspire Systems India has partnered with World Vision India to support one of their landmark project, ‘Restoration of livelihood’ and focus on COVID-19 affected households in few small towns in Tamil Nadu.
The programme aims to help 100 beneficiaries with livelihood options based on their needs, such as the supply of agriculture inputs, livestock, setting up of small shops, etc. The restoration efforts will help the beneficiaries in enhancing cash flow in the community to meet the daily consumption expenses and improve food and nutrition security among affected and reverse migration households
Empowering women with equal opportunities
For long women have been suppressed and held back citing various patriarchal reasons. It is time we create an inclusive society and change our attitude towards women as a weaker sex and provide them equal opportunities. Empowering women will transform individual lives, families ,societies and nations in a broader context.
Hindustan Unilever’s ‘Project Shakti’ is an initiative that aims to financially empower and provide livelihood opportunities to women in rural India. The Shakti Entrepreneurs are given training for familiarisation with many of the company’s products and basic tenets of distribution management. This programme has helped Shakti Entrepreneurs gain selling skills, become self-confident, improve their self-esteem and learn communication skills.
Creating self-reliance through skill enhancement
Being a country with more than one billion population and having a significant under-skilled youth is just a recipe for disaster. Setting up long-term skill enhancement programmes will not only empower the poor to a better livelihood but also uplift the society greatly.
National Aluminium Company Limited, (NALCO) has set up various skill enhancement centres in different parts of the country it operates, to improve the employability of women and youth. Some of the training are beautician course, food and nutrition, tailoring, motor winding, pump maintenance, farming etc.
Welfare of the farmer is welfare of the nation
If agriculture goes wrong in a nation, everything will eventually fall. That’s why farmers are one of the most valuable members of the society.
In India, agriculture is the source of employment for more than 50% of the population, accounting for nearly 16% of its GDP. However, in the last few decades, India’s focus on investment has shifted from farming to IT and other sectors. Thus, the Indian farmers have been lagging behind in many areas are not educated and thus are not adapted to technological development.
Mahindra & Mahindra has launched the Krishi Mitra project, in partnership with several NGOs, where it helps small and marginal farmers by educating them in updated techniques in farming. The project also provides various services leading to improvement in agricultural productivity, for the advantage of the farmers.
Besides initiating several individual projects aimed at improving livelihoods, many organisations from various sectors have come together to create a first-ever multiagency partnership called India Livelihoods Collective (ILC). Its sole objective is to scale-up livelihoods interventions in farm, non-farm and urban jobs ecosystems. It will also facilitate innovative solutions in rural livelihood opportunities in partnership with technology incubators and social businesses.
Image Source & References:
https://frontline.thehindu.com/
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/
The start of a new poverty narrative (brookings.edu)
Annual Report (brookings.edu)
Sustainability in CSR Projects for Village Development – India CSR Network
Home | India Livelihoods Collective (ilc.org.in)
Infographic: Education, livelihood draw most CSR spend | India News – Times of India (indiatimes.com)
Opportunities for women | Sustainable Living | Unilever global company website
National Farmers Day 2020: Top CSR Projects for Farmers’ Welfare in India – The CSR JournalIndia Development Review (idronline.org)
How do you solve a problem like livelihoods?
Sustainable livelihoods: Where donors need to focus
Project Shakti- CSR Projects India (csrbox.org)
CSR Initiatives Benefitting Farmers in India – The CSR Journal
As India is going through the process of globalisation and modernization, many villages are left behind, while the urban centers get the major chunk of attention. Improving the standards and self-reliance of the villagers at the same time preserving their lifestyle, can add great value to the larger development of the country.
Organisations can focus their CSR strategies by partnering with successful NGOs and community based Organisations (CBOs) and work towards upliftment of rural societies.
Wipro is well-known for its large contribution to society through its Wipro Foundation. Many of their projects are long-term multi-year programmes that are focused on build the capacity of the communities in terms of higher awareness and developing a higher degree of self-reliance to handle their own requirements.
Empowering them with employability:
Youths in villages and slums face extreme hardships in terms of opportunities for being useful to society, as they do not have the necessary skills to be employed or be entrepreneurial.
Focusing on setting up long-term projects, where students after school or college can train themselves to be productive members of society, can uplift the morale of the economically weaker communities.
Mahindra & Mahindra in partnership with Naandi Foundation initiated Mahindra Pride School. The idea was to recruit semi-educated youth from the villages and urban slums, train them and get them corporate jobs.
Educate to recycle:
When resources are hard to come by, recycling is the best method to adapt. Especially in rural, marginalized and unprivileged communities, adapting to renewable energy, waste management and resource conservation initiatives can make big difference.
Tata Power runs a programme called the Adhikaar which aims to inform, enable and empower marginalised communities. In collaboration with Rockefeller Foundation, they set up the Tata Power Renewable Microgrid Limited (TPRMG) to enable access to reliable and renewable electricity for 25 million Indians.
In another example, the Hindustan Unilever Foundation (HUF) manages the ‘Water for Public Good’ programme. The objective of this programme is to empower local communities to govern water resources and enhance farm-based livelihoods through the adoption of judicious water management practices. Since 2010, HUF has supported grassroots interventions in 53 districts with 23 NGO partners across over 4,300 villages in India.
Innovative farming methods
Although India is an agriculture-based country many farmers in villages still use outdated and ineffective methods that bring them very low yield. Educating them with innovative methods and providing them tools will empower them and enrich the whole community.
Over the past years, Coca-Cola India has built significant inroads into the farming community with its focus on good agricultural practices that provide forward linkages to the Indian farmers. Fruit Circular Economy (FCE) is a step towards addressing the issues of low farm productivity, poor technology adoption and fruit wastage by harnessing the higher productivity potential of fruits – both at the farm as well as processing level.
To truly put meaning behind any CSR project, the objective should be set on long-term development of aiming to empower weaker communities. Strategies inclusive of both aspects can deliver a much prosperous and equitable sustainable society that can help India to grow better and sustainable. 