Foundation Highlights Benefits of CSR

By David-Chyddy Eleke in Awka

Hero’s Foundation, a foundation owned by International Breweries Plc, has said through faithful implementation of their corporate social responsibilities (CSR), Nigerian companies can help tackle unemployment in the country.

The Company Secretary and Lawyer of International Breweries, Mr Muyiwa Ayojimi, stated this during a press conference to herald the commencement of the third phase of its programme, ‘Hero Kickstart,’ in Onitsha, Anambra State.

Ayojimi, said if every business entity sets aside one per cent of its profit and invest it in helping the society as CSR, the problem of unemployment could be overcome.

He said, “Kickstart is our own way of giving back to the society. What we do is, we set aside a percentage of profit made from every case of Hero beer sold and use it to sponsor business proposals from youths who have business ideas but lack the capital to start.

“This is the third year of the hero kickstart programme, it started in 2016. So far, we have empowered 64 entrepreneurs with N132 million. This year’s programme has just started, and we look forward to receiving 4,000 to 5,000 applications.

“I want to urge young people who have business ideas to submit their proposal through our website, where our team of experts look at them and determine the winning entries.”

Also, Michael Daramola, the Director, Legal and Corporate Affairs of the company, while making a presentation said the foundation has a team of experts who look at the entries and determine the winning ones.

“The amount we award to the winners vary. When we look at the proposals, sometimes we scale up the amount for a proposal, when we think the proposal is good, but the applicant has less knowledge of what the start-up may entail.

“We also scale some down when applicants state bogus amounts, and we still think that the proposal is good.”