Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) Pakistan launches its annual Sustainability Review, setting out how it has delivered on its strategy to provide a strong return for shareholders, while creating social and economic value in the communities where it operates.
As the largest international bank in the country, Standard Chartered is now truly a part of the social fabric of this country. Through the Bank's sustainability strategy we seek to strengthen relationships between the business, community, government and clients.
Giving back to the community remains an important part of Standard Chartered's sustainability agenda. In Pakistan, the Bank's community efforts are focused on education and health.
As a responsible company, the Bank has continued to transform people's lives through its community programmes with employees contributing more than 1,000 volunteering days. Globally, it surpassed the$100 million target for Seeing is Believing (SiB), the Bank's initiative to tackle avoidable blindness and visual impairment, two years earlier.
In Pakistan, the Bank's SiB journey in numbers is truly inspiring, impacting over 12 million beneficiaries. It has conducted over 500,000 sight restoring surgeries, trained over 60,000 lady healthcare workers, and screened over 1.5 million children for refractive errors, while we have 24 visually impaired employees working in the Bank.
SiB still have projects that will continue to be implemented till 2020 in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, Mansehra, Haripur, Swat and Swabi, with a focus on diabetic retinopathy and accelerating support for female cataract patients through our partners Sight Savers and Layton Rehmatulla Benevolent Trust (LRBT).
We are also leveraging this opportunity to announce the Bank's new Community Investment strategy, Future makers by Standard Chartered. This is our global initiative to tackle the issue of inequality and seeks to promote greater economic inclusion for young people in our communities. We will do this by supporting disadvantaged young people from low-income households, particularly girls and people with visual impairments, to take part in programmes focused on education, employability and entrepreneurship. For Pakistan, this would translate into furthering our Goal programme. Our adolescent girls' focused programme grew in its third year to span 17schools in Lyari, Saddar and Keemari and reached more than 4,500 girls. We will also be looking at providing a financially inclusive environment for females by launching initiatives such as Women in Tech.
Khadija Hashimi, Head of Corporate Affairs and Brand & Marketing, Standard Chartered, Pakistan said: "Here for good, our brand promise is all about commitment - to our customers and clients, to our people and to the communities where we work. Standard Chartered has been committed to the long term growth and development of this country.
"This commitment has spanned one and a half century and remains just as strong today. We stand firm in our determination to create long term value for society as well as our shareholders", she added.-PR
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