Under the aegis of Garima CSR Project initiated by Diversey India, and supported by Doctors For You (DFY) – a pan-India humanitarian organization; close to 80 hygiene technicians are now supporting COVID-19 casualty ward of Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Government Hospital (LNJP Hospital) in Delhi as frontline Corona Warriors.
Launched in 2016, Garima – the joint CSR initiative by Diversey India and DFY was conceptualized for uplifting the bottom-most strata within the hygiene industry – the “janitors” or “housekeepers”, as we call them. Derived from the philosophy of “Prevention is better than cure,” the role of a Hygiene Technician is critical when it comes to keeping infections and diseases at bay.
Garima which means dignity in Hindi, signifies the primary objective of this corporate social responsibility (CSR) programme: to instil dignity towards the humble profession of cleaning. This School of Hygiene trains the unskilled workers of India with scientific techniques of cleaning and helps them find livelihood with established Facility Management companies. In a span of three years, the initiative has trained close to 25,000 beneficiaries and 15,000 of them have been gainfully employed after the training.
Doctors For You, known for its capabilities in Disaster Management and emergency response, quickly adapted to Diversey’s post-outbreak SOPs for hygiene maintenance during the onset of nation-wide lockdown and continued their training efforts through web-calls, aligning their trainers in Bihar, Delhi and Tamil Nadu. The infection prevention training modules covered key topics as following:
– Introduction to COVID-19 and awareness of its prevention, treatment and management
– Use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
– Proper Hand hygiene technique
– Chemical efficacy of Virex-II 256, Oxivir-Five 16, Oxivir-TB wipes, Suma Tab and Avert Plus
– Cautious handling and disposal of bio-medical waste
– Contribution to healthcare and public places
Between March to May this year, 2,269 candidates were trained on infection prevention and placed with various Hospitals, Airports, Centralized kitchen, food outlets, Offices & educational institutes. “This is great evidence of the purpose of GARIMA coming to life. We started the CSR project with the threefold objectives; to improve the hygiene standards in the country, to address the skilled manpower gap for our customers and to bring dignity to the profession by bringing science and expertise. With the uplift from just being a Janitor, to a “Hygiene technician” to an “Infection prevention technician”; we have taken another quantum leap. We are pleased to bring a significant change to the lives of people from being unemployed to being on the frontlines of this battle against COVID-19,” said Himanshu Jain, President, Diversey APAC.
“It’s a responsibility we have taken seriously for our customers and their industries. We have brought best-in-class products like Oxivir and Virex and we’ve optimized them for easy adoption. Whilst the situation has been unnerving, we have been constantly working towards enhancing the level of awareness in hygiene, sanitation and infection prevention in the various sectors we operate. Our janitorial trainees from the Garima CSR initiative getting reskilled to manage the COVID-19 pandemic is a matter of great pride for Diversey India,” said LC Das, Managing Director, Diversey India & Subcontinent.
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