Room for ploughing back

Ndama Nakashole - Bidvest Namibia’s acting managing director of commercial and industrial services & products, Theo Mberirua, says although many corporates, including Bidvest, are spending a lot on corporate social responsibility (CSR) projects, it can never be enough.

Mberirua was a speaker at the Business 7 Impact breakfast event hosted by Namibia Media Holdings (NMH) in Windhoek on Tuesday.

In his presentation, titled, ‘Can Corporate Namibia Impact a Nation’, Mberirua said he did not think that those who were already involved in CSR could ever do enough, and invited other corporates to join them.

“It is always important to give back to communities. We have to continue doing what we are doing. Even though we may think it is enough, it will never be enough,” he said.

Giving back

Mberirua said since the company’s listing on the Namibia Stock Exchange (NSX) in 2009, Bidvest Namibia had paid a lot of money in taxes. Although these taxes were 50 percent less in 2017 than in 2016 because of changes in the operating environment, he said the company continued to plough back into the community.

Bidvest Namibia, which has over 3 000 employees at its subsidiaries, continued to affect the lives of hundreds of thousands of Namibians, according to Mberirua.

Through the Bidvest Namibia individual shareholding scheme alone, Mberirua said 250 000 Namibians were either directly or indirectly affected.

Bidvest has spent N$100 million on CSR projects all over the country in different areas, such as water, health, aquaculture, education and others.

Community uplift

Mberirua said the Namsov Community Trust (NCT), which has a 10% shareholding in Namsov Fishing, last year concluded its regional governors’ development programme started in 2015. Under that programme Namsov committed N$1.5 million per region over a period of three years.

“What we do is we give regional governors in all the 14 regions N$500 000 per year. We do not give them the money to put in their pockets but to fund identified projects,” he said.

Projects ranged from rural water supply, community development projects, enterprise development and, most importantly, youth development, he said.

Bidvest Namibia also awarded 146 study bursaries and was involved in health projects, the food bank and ICT projects where they donated computers to schools.

Bidvest also bought cattle for San communities living at the farm Ondera, where they were resettled by the government.

“What we did is, we bought cattle for the San people to look after. We told them that the cattle are not theirs but the offspring will be theirs.”

He said this enabled the San people at farm Ondera to take care of themselves and their families and send their children to school. Mberirua said despite some challenges, the farm Ondera project was doing well.

Bidvest Namibia also sponsored the NFA Cup football tournament to the tune of N$20 million.

Another CSR project that Bidvest Namibia is involved in is helping SMEs who are awarded contracts by the government or state-owned enterprises.

The fund assists SMEs with funds to start the work and so far, 20 SMEs have benefited from the fund since its launch in 2014.

For all these projects and others, Bidvest CSR employees travel all over the country to check up on the projects several times a year.

Voice your help

Namibia Media Holdings’ marketing manager, Hennie Geldenhuys, emphasised the importance of staying informed of what is happening in the economy. He urged corporates and other entities to contribute to NMH’s monthly, industry-themed Focus magazines.

“I would like to challenge you to have your voice in those magazines,” he said, urging corporates to talk to the NMH editorial team, client executives and sales people.