Two Indian companies LifeSpring Hospitals and Reuters Market Light are among the ten global companies to bag this year’s World Business and Development Awards. The biennial awards, awarded for improving the lives of most disadvantaged communities, were announced at the just-concluded UN summit on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in New York. The eight MDGs, endorsed by 189 countries, have set targets to reduce poverty, hunger, maternal and child deaths, disease, gender inequality and environmental degradation by 2015.
While Reuters Market Light was awarded for offering mobile phone-based information service to farmers in 15,000 villages, LifeSpring Hospitals was felicitated for offering affordable and high quality maternal care to low-income mothers via its nine hospitals in India. Other winners include Cemex, Eli Lilly & Company, GroFin/Shell Foundation, Heineken, Novartis, Nuru Energy, Royal DSM and Walmart Mexico.
Amit Mehra, MD, Reuters Market Light, told FE in an email, “This prestigious award recognises that our pioneering business is making a contribution however modest to achieve one of the MDGs. It would encourage us to continue to innovate and deliver a cutting-edge service to the farming community. Going forward, the company is planning to accelerate scaling up and to improve services to meet the information needs of the farming community.”
Anant Kumar, CEO, LifeSpring Hospitals, added, “We hope the award would help us create stronger partnerships with other organisations and companies, both in India and internationally.” LifeSpring also hopes to attract talented professionals dedicated to its mission and smarter capital to aid expansion and serve thousands of lower-income women across India..
The judges also commended ten other companies, including Feedback Ventures, Mahindra and Mahindra and Tata Consultancy Services from India. All the winners were chosen out of 172 initiatives, which demonstrated how inclusive business can eradicate poverty.
Launched by the International Chamber of Commerce, the five-year-old awards are organised by the United Nations Development Programme and the International Business Leaders Forum. The awards seek to showcase best practices and promote their exchange to alleviate poverty.
Source: The Financial Express
Published on 25 September 2010