CSR Report: L&T in 100 Crore Club of corporate social responsibility

L&T is an engineering and construction conglomerate with a concern for the community. Even before the CSR section was introduced in the Companies Act 2013, L&T had been interacting with the community around L&T facilities and providing health, education and skills development services to those who needed it most.

According to the company’s annual report 2017-2018, the prescribed CSR spend was 97.29 Cr, the actual spend amounted to 100.92 Cr in this financial year.

Building on many decades of social responsibility activities, the company contributes to inclusive growth by empowering communities and accelerating development through interventions in water & sanitation, health, education and skill development. L&Teering, a structured volunteering programme, inspires and empowers employee volunteers or L&T-eers to contribute their time to community development programmes supported by the Company. The employees’ wives and female employees power the Prayas Trust, driving CSR initiatives in their own capacity and reaching out to remote communities.

Here is a snapshot of the company’s CSR interventions across four key thrust areas: Water & sanitation, education, health and skill-development.

Water and sanitation

The Integrated Community Development Program of L&T started in 2014-15, focused on making water – the very ‘necessity of life’ – available to four water stressed districts in Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, covering 11006 households across an area of 9337 hectares. With an agenda focused on community empowerment through Integrated Community Development, they have ensured water availability for drinking, sanitation and agriculture.

Interventions

• The water and soil conservation structures like check dams, anicuts, contour trenches, farm bunds and farm ponds constructed with the participation and contribution of the community helped in increasing the water level in the water bodies in these villages and retain soil moisture.
• The community groups like Village Development Committees (VDCs) with 50 per cent participation from women and Self Help Groups (SHGs) were created. They assumed the responsibility to maintain the structures created through the project
• Farmers were trained in agricultural practices with optimal use of water and use of zero budget natural fertilisers to retain the fertility of the land. The community members also devised methods that improve the arability of land.

Sanitation drives

The Swachha Bharat Program gave the necessary impetus to initiate the sanitation drive in villages. L&T trained local youth in masonry skills and used local materials to achieve the following:

• Construction of over than 970 well-designed toilet-cum-bathrooms
• Community-based monitoring committees to deter open defecation

Impact

• Access to water for drinking, sanitation, irrigation, cultivation of fodder and extra crops
• Two revenue villages and 13 hamlets are open defecation free, benefitting 1100 households
• Improved economies, for 11000 households, raising the aspirations of the people.
• Chettipalayam watershed project, South Coimbatore, enabled water holding of 47 lakh litres in one year and made 18 hectares of barren land cultivable.

Education

L&T tries to make quality education accessible to each and every child by introducing relevant curriculum, improving teaching methods and ensuring parent and community participation in creating learning environment.

Interventions

Basic Infrastructural support includes construction or repair of the classrooms, toilet blocks and water stations for basic hygiene facilities, midday meal kitchens and sports ground.

Educational support: Supplies such as uniforms, textbooks, notebooks and sports kits are provided to underprivileged students in government and unaided low-income schools in rural and tribal villages.

Balwadi program: L&T strengthens early childhood development program by improving the quality of balwadis and anganwadis in urban slums and rural areas, ensuring entry into the mainstream education system and improved enrolment in the primary schools.

• Supplementary food is provided in tribal balwadis.
• Toy vans visiting anganwadis provide necessary childhood development activities
• Training of Trainers for Balwadi teachers for capacity building.

Afterschool community study centres offer supplementary education and reach out to the first generation learners and children from weaker sections.

• Efforts are directed towards designing a curriculum for easy learning that is aligned with the school curriculum.

Focus on Science Innovation and Technology

• L&T has supported Government initiatives and sponsored Mini Science Centres in rural schools, simplifying complex scientific concepts
• A Science on Wheels program reaches out to 3293 children in 17 schools, encouraging students to develop interest in science and technology-related subjects.
• To facilitate the access of e-learning technology to rural and tribal students, L&T has provided computer labs and digital classrooms in several rural schools.

Capacity building: Teacher Training Programmes are conducted to enhance the quality of education being imparted to students studying in Government schools and low-income trust run schools.

Overall development of children:

• Children are also given inputs on life-skills and extra-curricular activities such as dance, music and drawing.
• Educational and recreational outings are organised
• Specialised health camps are organised for children for eye check-up, early detection and treatment of anaemia, malnutrition and other childhood diseases.
• Education sessions on health and hygiene with children and adolescents are conducted for preventive care and for promoting healthy sanitation practices.

Creating learning environment: The community level School Management Committee (SMC) and parents are invited for a dialogue to encourage students to continue their education, as well as for sustaining L&T’s efforts in future.

Impact

• 250 schools gained better facilities that increased enrolment and retention of students.
• 1,56,168 students covered through our education projects this year.

Health

L&T’s CSR programme in the health sector aims at making quality healthcare services accessible and affordable without anyone having to face financial hardship. L&T focuses on strengthening the Government’s health programmes like family welfare, mother and child health, HIV-AIDS, Tuberculosis, Blindness control, Diabetes detection and treatment and reproductive health services. It also provides services related to lifestyle diseases like hypertension and cardiac problems.

Interventions

Health Centres: A team around ninety well-qualified medical rehabilitation consultants and 12 professionally staffed, well-equipped multi-speciality centres provide the following services:

Physical health: Health Centre offers tertiary health services including Family Planning surgeries, Day Care General Surgeries, Endoscopy Procedures and Dental Procedures. It also provides eye checks, mother and child health care, physiotherapy and occupational therapy, infertility treatment, hearing-speech services and a skin clinic focusing on leprosy treatment and communicable diseases.

Psychological health: Psychiatric OPDs and family counselling services address mental health and stress related issues, while a Child Guidance Clinic helps younger members of the community.

Health Camps:

• Mobile health vans visit the communities around the centre.
• Specialised health camps covering Eye care, dental, Paediatric and Gynaecological care.
• Specialised health promotion programme with focus on hygiene, reproductive health and family life education for children and adolescents in Government remand and corrective homes and homes for neglected children
• HIV and AIDS Management Programme: L&T’s state-of-the-art Anti-Retroviral Treatment (ART) centre provides diagnostic, medical and counselling services in association with National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO).

TB related services: Comprehensive TB related treatment in Mumbai including individualised treatment OPD, check-up, diagnostics, medicines and nutrition, support, home visits and counselling. L&T runs an exclusive TB clinic in Koldongri, in the suburbs of Mumbai, in partnership with the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) providing CAT I, II and IV treatment to the patients, with a cure rate of 85-90%.

Dialysis centres: 2384 dialysis sessions have been conducted at the L&T-run kidney dialysis centre at Thane.

Cancer detection camps: Targeted at women, L&T promotes preventive education and early diagnosis of cervical and breast cancer through cancer detection camps.

Impact

350076 Lives touched through various health services

Skill Development

Skill development has emerged as a key strategy to realize the potential of demographic advantage of having the youngest workforce with an average age of 29 years in India. L&T’s skill building initiative aims to create human resources for improving the country’s competitiveness and growth, especially in the field of Construction skills by training the youth.

Interventions

Construction Skills Training Institutes (CSTIs): L&T runs 9 CSTIs in 9 states, providing free training in construction skills for the large unorganised workforce in the sector, making them employable.

Employable skills training for women

At many L&T sites, local women, young girls and physically-challenged persons are trained in various employable skills as per their interests and aptitude. The courses include Tailoring, Embroidery, Beautician Course, Food Processing, Home Management, Computer Skills, Basic Education and Basic Health.

Impact

• 7365 youth completed various courses at CSTIs this year
• 15338 people have been trained in employable vocational skills this year.

2000 women became self-reliant!

The objective of the programme run by L&T Kolkata, was to empower women in the slums of Kolkata and neighbouring villages, by providing them with alternative paid employment by manufacturing products for the local and overseas markets, and to improve the status of women and girls in the society. More than 2000 women are engaged in small enterprise such as tailoring of garments, beauty culture, home furnishing, spices, jam, pickle, crochet, weaving, knitting, block printing and Kantha stitch, etc. This programme is not only empowering the women economically but also helping instil self-confidence. Their monthly average income is between INR 5000 and INR 8000.