Sunday, August 19, 2007 Buy Pinoy Exporters fair promotes corporate social responsibility
IN THEIR interest to increase involvement of the business sector in addressing gripping poverty in the country, organizers of the 13th Buy Pinoy Exporters Trade Fair will focus on corporate social responsibility (CSR) during the opening ceremonies.
Lawyer Alexander Lacson, author of the best-selling book ‘12 Little Things That Every Filipino Can Do to Help Our Country”, will be the main speaker. He will talk on ways entrepreneurs or exporters and even ordinary Filipino citizens can practice CSR and contribute in solving poverty.
Employment generation is one activity where exporters participate in this program, according to Marlane Villa-Real, chairperson of the trade fair Committee.
“In partnership with the Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc. or Philexport, we have institutionalized our CSR program into a similar service we call Exporter-Subcontractor Matching Program. Under this, exporters who receive orders but do not have enough manpower to complete them may opt to work with a group of subcontractors whom the exporter will train,” she said.
“The beauty behind this program is that subcontractors are trained to meet actual orders, and thus will not be frustrated for lack of market to absorb the products they have made,” she added.
To-date, the program has facilitated the setting-up of at least five sub-contactors, mostly in Luzon, with five exporter-partners who give them training and orders that have reached over P20 million in the last five years.
A company can also adopt Corporate-Community Business Partnership that encourages and connects big businesses to invest in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as part of its local supply chain, added Villa-Real. A number of good examples around but need to be promoted and consciously practiced and pursued by established businesses.
She cited the Employers Confederation of the Philippines (Ecop) for the success of its Big Enterprise, Small Enterprise (Ebese) program where the likes of multinational companies such as Yazaki-Torres Manufacturing Corporation are matched with small subcontractors that is trained to supply Yazaki-Torres at quality and competitive terms and conditions.
The semi-annual Buy Pinoy Exporters Fair at the Megatrade Hall 1 of SM Megamall in Mandaluyong City started last August 16 and ends on Sunday. Dubbed as “World class Philippine Products for Filipino Buyers”, the fair hopes to instill among local consumers the habit of buying Philippine-made items.
Through the fair, Filipinos buy Philippine products that are normally available on the shelves of international retailers. The additional domestic market is also hoped to provide more jobs under the “Buy Pinoy, Save Jobs” philosophy of the Buy Pinoy Movement of which Philexport is a deeply committed partner-organization together with its original partner organization, the Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FFCCCII).
The 13th Buy Pinoy will have Rizal Province as its provincial partner to showcase the various raw materials, finished goods and provincial capacity of manufacturers in this area.
Other organizers are the Philippine Food Processors and Exporters Organization Inc.(Philfoodex),Philippine Chamber of Handicraft Industries (PCHI) and Philexport in partnership with the Federation of Filipino-Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry Inc. (FFCCCII) and the Philippine Export Import (PhilExim). Proceeds of the fair will be used for development programs and activities to strengthen the SME sector, especially the exporters. (Liza C. Leong/Philexport News and Features/Sunnex)
