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BAT EAST AND SOUTHERN AFRICA MARKETS
BAT is on a transformation journey, one aimed at Building A Better Tomorrow for consumers, employees, society and shareholders. Crispin Achola, General Manager for BAT’s BAT East & Southern Africa Markets and his team, paint a succinct picture of the Company’s corporate responsibility and sustainability vision, and progress being made. “As a leading local and global company, we understand our impact, the importance of high standards of integrity and our evolving societal responsibilities. And while sustainability has always been important to our business for decades, today, we are building on this foundation and placing sustainability at the front and centre of everything we do.
We have made significant progress on our sustainability journey as reflected by various accolades and certifications, such as issuance of our third energy compliance certificate in 2022 by the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) – (BAT Kenya was first to receive the certificate and is currently one of only eight organisations in Kenya with the certification), multi-year certification by the global Top Employers Institute as a Top Employer in Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique and Africa, being named the 2022 Accenture Gender Mainstreaming Champion in Africa and receiving the prestigious global Alliance for Water Stewardship certification for our Kenya operation, amongst others.
Yet, our approach needs to constantly evolve. Today, we are accelerating progress across our Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) priorities by creating shared value, ultimately towards building a sustainable future. Anchored on our renewed purpose – to build A Better Tomorrow for our stakeholders – we are accelerating the transformation of our business and industry.
Key outcomes include offering a range of viable and responsibly marketed products in nicotine and beyond; reducing the health and environmental impacts of our business and raising standards for everyone across our value chain, creating a purposeful place to work for our employees and delivering superior and sustainable returns for our shareholders. At the same time, we remain committed to ensuring robust corporate governance across the Business. Our ambition is underpinned by a robust sustainability agenda. This is aligned to applicable UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and outlines clear measurable targets, which we track regularly with oversight at senior management and Board levels. Some of our targets include achieving carbon neutrality for scope 1 & 2 emissions by 2030 and scope 3 by 2050, 50/50 gender balance across the organisation and Management by 2025, increasing the representation of people with disabilities to 5% by 2025 (we are a member of the Kenya Business and Disabilities Network), and enabling prosperous livelihoods for our contracted farmers, trade partners, amongst others.
Looking into 2023 and beyond, I remain optimistic about the future of our business and delighted to lead talented individuals with whom we share one vision. I am confident that alongside our business partners including traders and suppliers, our shareholders and other stakeholders, we will deliver A Better Tomorrow”.
“As part of efforts to create a great place to work, we have programmes such as Parents@BAT which provides biological and adoptive parents the support they need, including 16 weeks of maternity leave and an onsite mothers’ room for nursing mothers. On diversity and inclusion, we are proud that over 40% of our total population and in Management are women. To build the next generation of leaders, we collaborate with selected institutions of higher learning to mentor continuing female students in Sciences, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)”.
Lucy Evara, Head of Human Resources
“The only way to avoid smoking-related health risks is to not start, or quit smoking. However, we encourage those who would otherwise continue to smoke, to switch completely to scientifically substantiated alternatives. As a business, we believe that it is our responsibility to help transition smokers to these alternatives, which have the potential to reduce the public health burden associated with smoking. We are well on our journey to providing these alternatives in our markets in East & Southern Africa, including Kenya and La Reunion.
Dr. Douglas Weru, Scientific Engagement Manager
“Our corporate responsibility approach is anchored on three principles: The principle of Mutual Benefit which is the basis on which we build our relationships with our stakeholders, the principle of Responsible Product Stewardship through which we meet legitimate consumer demand for our products and the principle of Delivery with Integrity, which is the basis on which our business should be managed. These principles underpin our sustainability framework USTAWI through which we seek to create shared value for our stakeholders”
Mimi Mavuti, Corporate Affairs Manager
“We run various integrated sustainability initiatives in our operations including recycling where we work with local recyclers, resulting in zero waste sent to landfill. We have also invested significantly in high efficiency technology and renewable energy, and run carbon emission and sequestration programmes including creation of carbon sinks through afforestation. Through our afforestation programme KIJANI, we target to plant at least 2 million trees annually and in collaboration with various stakeholders, have recorded over 54 million surviving trees planted in Kenya since 1978”.
Stephen Muli, Sustainability Manager
“We have long been committed to good corporate governance and achieving our business objectives in an honest, transparent and accountable way. Our values are reflected in various policies and principles, including our Standards of Business Conduct, which demonstrate our commitment to good corporate behaviour. We also drive self-regulatory programmes such as prevention of underage access to our products, and provision of a confidential whistle-blowing portal for employees and stakeholders to report any concerns about our business conduct”.
Doris Otiato, Governance & Compliance Counsel
“Our contracted tobacco farmers are valued business partners, and we want them to be self-sufficient and prosperous. Through our farmer livelihoods programme THRIVE, we support farmers in Kenya in various ways, including training on sustainable agriculture, facilitating crop and health insurance, supporting farmer Savings and Credit Cooperative Organisation programs to help them generate additional and sustainable income as well as providing certified maize seeds and others subsistence crops to drive food security. For the wider community, we implement va
Sohel Rana, Head of Leaf
