As a concept, CSR makes perfect sense; it links businesses to environmental change and community development.  Over the next 40 years, $55 trillion in philanthropic resources are expected to be created in the US alone. These modern industrialists and I.T. magnates could have simply spent their gains on ever more sumptuous ranches, private islands, airplanes, etc, but choose instead to deploy it, for example, fighting TB, AIDS, or funding inner-city literacy campaigns. Tata, the Indian industrial giant, has for years reserved 66% of its profits for charitable causes; it pays full health and educational expenses for all its employees in Jamshedpur and runs the local schools and a 1000 bed hospital. A rapid spread of philanthropy is exactly what the world needs, both in terms of actual cash and of people's time to give others the benefits of their talents. Not only does it directly benefit the recipients, it further engages the givers in working for the common good and developing their own understanding of issues.

There is evidence to show that in many countries, a surge of giving tends to follow whenever there is wealth creation. Sir Elton John has dug deep into his fortune to help people with Aids. Investor Christopher Hohn was so appalled to see children scavenging for food on a rubbish dump in the Philippines that in 2003, he launched his own hedge fund, the Children's Investment Fund, and designed it so that one third of its annual management fee, plus half of all the profits earned above a minimum return of 11 per cent, would go automatically to his charitable foundation to help needy children. It has generated at least £1.4 billion, making it one of Britain's largest charities. The Children's Investment Fund Foundation has helped provide cheap anti-retroviral drugs to poor children with HIV/AIDS, saving countless lives. Many other hedge funders, investment bankers and private equity investors are also opening their wallets for good causes. One of the best examples is in New York, where billionaire mayor Michael Bloomberg has persuaded rich people to pay for innovative schemes that he thinks are too politically risky to fund with taxpayers' money. These include paying poor parents to ensure their children go to school (like the state sponsored bolsa familia in Brazil that has drastically reduced the high level of truancy amongst poor school children), and providing matching funds to poor people who open a bank account.

What is the situation in Paradise Island? It is really difficult to escape the conclusion that CSR is too often considered to be an adjunct of the marketing department, more of an exercise in public relations than a serious attempt to achieve social change. The reality of CSR is yet to catch up with the rhetoric and many projects are based more on image than on genuine social concern.One gets the firm impression that companies are increasingly using the buzz phrase "corporate social responsibility" in a bid to lose their image as money obsessed organisations that could not care less for the deprived and disadvantaged living a stone's throw from the walls of their luxury villas. One has to only look at the tiny amount of money devoted to CSR and which is skimmed from the vast profits of our major companies to realise that this is by and large a public relations exercise fashioned to perfection on the cheap.

The Mauritius Commercial Bank has earmarked 1% of its annual profits after taxation to CSR; during 2007-2008, the princely sum of Rs23 millions (an amount less than the annual salary of Withers, its director...)will be used to "à travers des actions concrètes menées aux niveaux national et local, à mieux répondre aux exigences sociales du pays". It would be nice to know exactly what specific projects it has in mind to answer the exigences sociales du pays with an amount of money that is less than its bonus schemes for its board of directors…During the financial year ending 31^st March 2008, MCB registered a 58.2% increase in its net profits to Rs 2.8 billions. Would shareholders really object if, for example, the bank would enter into an agreement with the government for a matched funding scheme and thereby create an endowment for students from deprived backgrounds to attend our poorly funded university? An endowment made up of Rs 100 millions from the government and Rs 100 millions from the bank would immediately allow many of our poor students to aim for the ambition that would otherwise remain unfulfilled because of circumstances outside their control. Would the bank really miss Rs 100 millions out of annual profits of Rs 2.8 billions? It doesn't seem to have had any problems absorbing the hundreds of millions lost in the pensions fund scandal or with the Rs 51 millions lost as a result of the armed robbery.

It would be pointless here to even mention the State Bank; no mainstream newspaper has ever entertained any criticism of that institution, and would immediately censor anything that sheds any light on the problematical culture in that place. Perhaps it is all to do with their own brand of corporate responsibility that gave Reddy, its previous number one, an annual salary of Rs36 millions, and Sithanen's protege, the current Director, Rajah Ramdaursingh an unconfirmed salary of Rs 1.5 million a month. Or perhaps it has to do with all those secret, private accounts of those people telling us they are servi nou pei...

AHRIM has adopted 'Nou Pran Kont' as its slogan for CSR. Beachcomber's net profits increased by 75% to Rs 1.9 billions last year, and it will now devote a miserly Rs 20 millions to pran kont. Rogers has assigned Rs 40 millions for CSR for the next three years, which amounts annually to about a tenth of the total amount of money it gave to politicians in the notorious caisse noire scandal. Patrice Legris, the Chief Executive Officer of AHRIM, proudly proclaimed that the CSR annual budget for his organisation will be approximately Rs 40 millions, from an industry earning billions of rupees every year, and which has vastly benefited from the reduction in Capital Gains Tax. Would it create such a dent in their profits if they could embark on a real programme of providing proper facilities like shower cubicles, toilets, litter bins, picnic benches, etc on the public beaches that have not been yet appropriated for their hotels and IRS ventures?

The evidence so far suggests that those companies in Mauritius proclaiming loudly their adherence to the principles of CSR are failing to match their words with the appropriate action. What is it that stops a hugely profitable company to, for example, build a properly equipped gymnasium for the local school? Or to provide that same school with their old, still functional computers? Or to provide a well stocked library so that all children can participate fully in the learning process and not just those who can afford to? Our hugely profitable hotels seem to be in a process of complete refurbishment almost every two years; what happens to the beds and furniture that were deemed surplus to requirement or not in tune with the new décor? Were any of them given to those unfortunate people who lost all their belongings during the recent flooding? The government provided nearly Rs 25 millions to those who were most severely affected; what did the private sector provide? Why can't a company that is making at least Rs 1 billion profit every year purchase and donate medical equipment to our hospitals?  

There is no doubt that CSR can make companies more innovative and forge better links with the communities in which they live. But it can all too easily slide into a cynical public relations exercise which ultimately will backfire on those paying lip service to it. True philanthropy is private action for the public good  and can be traced as far back as Plato's gift of land as an endowment for his academy. Converting CSR into a cynical public relations exercise that consists of vague, non specific goals is nothing but deception, and the lack of concrete results will confirm its transmutation into a massive con job on the community it had pledged to help.

One can only hope that our profitable companies can see the huge benefits of a properly administered CSR programme. Our hotels could start by helping Assad Peeroo with his highly laudable venture to convert the grossly immoral waste of vast amounts of food in hotels into decent meals for the disadvantaged in our society.
 
R.A.J.

Email: servipei@yahoo.com