In a world characterised by ever increasing trust deficit in the corporate sector, growing disparities and formidable development challenges that can no longer be looked after just by governments alone – it’s time for companies to revaluate their commitment towards society at large.
Accordingly, companies need to undertake actions to address a renewed set of societal expectations.
The recent regulatory developments in India also point the compass in the same direction by:
- The release of the National Voluntary Guidelines for Social, Environmental and Economic Responsibilities of Business.
- Making reporting (disclosing social and environmental performance in the form of Business Responsibility Reports) mandatory for the top 100 listed companies. And, most recently, by inclusion of the CSR clause within the Companies Act, 2013, encouraging companies to spend at least 2% of their average net profit in the previous three years on CSR activities.
A few large companies have been practising CSR for decades but Clause 135 of the newly enacted Companies Act 2013 asks more companies to do work toward enhancing their social contributions. Some will invariably struggle in the initial years. Keeping this in mind, PwC has developed a handbook for companies to serve as a companion as they move ahead on their CSR journey.
The Handbook starts by building a common understanding of CSR as a concept, drawing inputs from global and Indian practices and in line with the intent and provisions of the CSR clause in the new Companies Act, 2013.
The latter half of the Handbook focuses on the ‘what’ and ‘how’ of strategising, planning, execution and monitoring the CSR activities. The attempt is to provide guidance rather than prescriptions for each of the related processes.
The Handbook also talks about what small and medium enterprises can do collectively to comply with the new CSR mandate as some of these enterprises will fall under the inclusion set of the mandate.
You can view the Handbook by clicking this link: https://www.pwc.in/en_IN/in/assets/pdfs/publications/2013/handbook-on-corporate-social-responsibility-in-india.pdf
Please feel free to drop in your comments and suggestions.
Ankit Gupta works as a senior consultant with PwC’s Sustainabilty and Climate Change practice in India. PwC’s network of 700 sustainability and climate change professionals in more than 60 countries advises clients on setting strategy, advising on policy, risk management, operational change, and monitoring and reporting – all through a sustainability lens. For more information on what we do and how we can help your company, please visit our website: http://www.pwc.com/sustainability