ITC Facilitates Creation of Livelihood Opportunities in Rural Sector During the Pandemic

Opportunities

* Leverages the MGNREGS scheme of the Government of India

* Adopts a 4 pronged approach –Mobilisation of people, Facilitation by engaging with local authorities, Technical Support during execution, Focus on Asset Building

In line with its commitment to put Nation First and responding to the needs arising out of the unprecedented lockdown implemented to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, ITC has spearheaded a unique initiative to enable the creation of an eco-system that would lead to signification livelihood generation for farmers and daily wage earners under the ambit of the Government’s MGNREG Scheme.  

While ITC had already put in place a comprehensive plan to provide relief to the needy as well as the frontline warriors in 25 states within days of the lockdown, the Company also recognized that economic rehabilitation of its rural stakeholders was the crying need of the hour, given that there was significant loss of livelihood among marginal farmers and landless labourers. The situation was compounded further by challenges arising out of reverse migration.

As soon as restrictions on agricultural activities were eased, ITC swung into action. Initiating discussions with the government and people on the ground, ITC galvanized its NGO partners to mobilise farmers and wage earners in the catchment areas of its operations to enable them access work opportunities under MGNREGS. Extensive dialogues were carried out with authorities at the Taluk and block levels to identify families in distress and help them apply for job cards if they don’t have one already. A holistic plan was put in place covering the safety of the workers and ensuring the creation of long-term assets for the people, including structures for water conservation like irrigation tanks, farm ponds and field bunds that would also enhance crop productivity.

Commenting on this pioneering initiative, Mr S Sivakumar, Group Head of ITC’s Agri Business said “Inspired by its credo of Nation First: Sab Saath Badhein, ITC, in collaboration with district administrations and NGO partners, is enabling the rural workforce in the catchment of its operations to access income generating opportunities under the MGNREG Scheme.The objective is to scale up this programme by extending it to more regions in these unprecedented and challenging times”.

ITC also provided technical support for planning and execution of work in different areas. To demonstrate outcome, impact data was shared with the Government. Emphasis was laid on adoption of requisite precautions, quality of work and output, large-scale employment generation and asset creation as well as helping in timely muster submission and payments.

The scale and impact of the programme was significant. Within just 45 days, 7.6 lakh person days of work, valued at Rs 17 crores, was created. This was heartening, given that initially there was lack of clarity on protocols for initiating work under MGNREGS. In the short span of time, the programme has been scaled up to cover 1,467 villages in 63 districts across 14 states.  

Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka Ensures Safety of Employees through Precautionary Measures

Vedanta Iron Ore has put in place measures to help mitigate the risk from coronavirus to employees and their families. The measures are intended to provide greater security to the employees by restricting the spread of the virus. The company has taken plentiful precautionary measures to fight this pandemic. Vedanta as a responsible corporate is fully committed to the safety of people, their families who are extended part of the Vedanta family and the communities. 

Mr. Krishna Reddy, Director, Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka Business said, “As per MHA guidelines, the company has resumed limited operations subject to necessary precautions as mandated by various advisories being implemented for a safe working environment. We are taking all responsible actions and mandated safety protocols issued by various authorities in order to help stop the spread of Coronavirus. We are providing utmost care to the safety of people working with our company. Life of people is of extreme importance for us and will always remain our furthermost priority.”.

Mr. Prasanna HP, Assistant Security Officer, M/s Walson Services Private Limited (Contractor Company) said, “Our team is stationed at the Iron Ore Karnataka Business to ensure a safe work environment for the people in this extraordinary situation. The initiatives taken by Iron Ore Karnataka management ensures workers’ safety inside office premises. The whole system is set in place by the management and all the employees adheres to it. The management has also provided our team with PPEs to restrict the spread and for us to carry out our duties without any chance of infection.”.

The biggest challenge faced by Iron Ore Karnataka amid the pandemic has been to motivate employees and keep the work momentum going with limited operations, limited workforce and maintaining all health protocols viz social distancing, use of PPEs etc. The company is ensuring strict adherence to precautionary measures. 

Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka is taking the following actions aimed at limiting the spread of COVID-19:

* Enhanced facility hygiene practices including increasing the frequency with which high touch surfaces are cleaned. Safety precautions including supply of sanitizers, protective gears, masks, regular temperature checks and recording of all the work force at the Entrance Gate and availability of 24x7 medical support for further course of action if there is any abnormality found in the workers. Hands-free hand wash basins are located at all entry gates and hand wash facilities spread across all the worksites. 

* The residential doctor at Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka distributes triple layered masks on a daily basis and has provided personal sanitizer bottles that have to carried every day (strict checking is done) for the safety of the employees, contractors and workmen working at the mines. Working during these times can be highly stressful, the residential doctor conduct awareness sessions on the importance of mental health. 

* Ensuring minimal gathering and social distancing protocols at workplaces. To ensure the social distancing inside the company premises is been maintained, a team of 3 ESM Security Personnel’s in 1st & 2nd Shift and circles are made at Sesa 01, Canteen area, Gates and attendance reader installed locations.

* Providing employees with flexibility around work schedules and recommending that they work from home, to the extent feasible and appropriate. Direct and indirect employees residing in affected and suspected have been asked to not report to work & there has been no denial on their salaries. Additional commute buses operate to maintain social distancing during travel to work. 

* Verification of the travel history of workforce has been initiated by the company before an employee is re-joining the company along with a declaration in prescribed format.  All essential business-related travel has been restricted for all the employees. Quarantine facility has been made available at a dedicated company apartment and those arriving from other states are tested for COVID-19 with a swab test & are quarantined mandatorily for 14 days. 

* To ensure safety, security and wellbeing of our stakeholders, especially our communities and employees,  Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka handed over a drone camera with tablet to the Office of Superintendent of Police, Chitradurga to assist them to safeguard the people of the district in the pandemic. Provision of drone camera will benefit business continuity and safety as it guarantees proper surveillance and assures a safe environment for our employees, contractors and workmen to work, commute and live in. 

* Fumigation and sanitization in the Mines facility and transportation are being done on frequent basis. Continuous awareness on the situation and preventive measures are being conducted for direct and indirect employees via tool box talks and virtual platforms. 

In line with Vedanta philosophy of care and community welfare, Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka Business has also been working in close- coordination with the Office of District Administration of Chitradurga, to help them in providing necessary infrastructure and provisioning of protective equipment across COVID- 19 medical facilities in the district. Apart from the contribution of Rs. 201 crores by the Group Chairman Mr. Anil Agarwal to combat COVID-19 pandemic, Vedanta Iron Ore Karnataka has donated Rs. 1 crore each to the CM Relief Funds of Goa and Karnataka state government. 

Vedanta Iron Ore at Karnataka has always had a symbolic relationship with Chitradurga Community for many decades and in this critical situation the company has handed over 10 ICU cots and 10 Multi- Para Monitor to the District Administration set to be installed at the COVID – 19 Relief District Hospital along 500 sanitiser bottles, 2500 triple layer N95 masks, 500 personal protection kits and an ambulance for emergency medical facilities. The company has also, handed over 3400 ration kits to the District Administration Office to help them be well prepared in the current situation. Besides this, Vedanta Iron Ore at Karnataka distributed 2600 three layered cloth masks to police officers, health workers and the community people across Chitradurga district handmade by local SHG women over the course of two weeks.

80,000 engineers to be absorbed in IT sector by 2010

Software industry body, Nasscom expects at least 70,000-80,000 engineering graduates who passed out in June 2009 and were offered jobs in their 5th and 6th semesters by TCS, Infosys and Accenture, among others, to get absorbed by March 2010. Not too long ago, there were apprehensions that the appointments of these tech grads could get deferred till 2011 in the aftermath of the global slowdown. However, the perception appears to have changed.

Speaking to the media, Nasscom Vice-President Sangeeta Gupta said, "There's some amount of pick-up in IT spending and clients have become active in the decision-making process. This augurs well for the IT industry and is likely to result in hiring by IT companies. Companies like TCS, Infosys and Accenture, among others, are expected to start honouring the offers they made. As a result, at least 70k-80k engineering graduates, who were issued offer letters, are expected to get absorbed by March 2010."

For instance, the country's biggest software firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) had made some 24,000 offers in 2008-09, according to its Q2 analyst call. The company had indicated that it would honour these offers this fiscal. In Q3, TCS is expected to absorb about 8,000-odd, and the balance, in the following quarter. Till Q2, the company had absorbed some 1,800 people.

Similarly, Infosys, in its Q2 earnings call, indicated that it would add 20,000 people instead of 18,000 indicated earlier. The additional 2,000 would be partly in BPO while the rest would make up laterals at Infosys Technologies.

Incidentally, Nasscom has urged member companies to recruit those who've completed their eighth semester to ensure that hiring is closer to the need of companies. For this fiscal, Nasscom has projected a mere 4-7 percent export growth. It is likely, that with IT sector showing signs of recovery, Nasscom will review the export target. "We can review the export target by end- December," she added.

McKinsey in its report titled 'Perspectives in the IT industry by 2020', has noted that with the current pace of reforms and expected constraints in talent and infrastructure supply, the exports component of the Indian IT industry is slated to reach $175 billion in revenues by 2020. The domestic component will contribute $50 billion in revenues by 2020, which is larger than the total export revenues for India now.

Agencies

500+ BPO jobs to move from Australia to India: Vodafone

Vodafone Hutchison has announced that it will be offshoring 450 call center jobs from Australia to Tasmania and India. A spokesman for Vodafone Hutchison Australia said that company would transfer an unspecified number of positions to a call centre in Mumbai and about 100 jobs to Kingston, Tasmania.

Service Stream, the company that was running Vodafone contract confirmed the telecom operator's plans to end the contract employing 450 in customer service and support roles starting in October to February. Michael Doery, Managing Director of Service Stream says that the company would try to find new roles for the affected employees, but was unlikely to accommodate them. "We're trying to do the right thing for our staff but not give them false expectations. Call centre people are unlikely to suit the other sort of work we do, which is technically-based or based on outdoor civil activities. If a company we're providing services to makes a decision to in-source call centre jobs to Tasmania and India, that's not our decision," Doery said.

The decision to transfer call center jobs out of Australia comes three months after Vodafone Australia and Hutchison 3G Australia formed a 50:50 joint venture. Speaking on the current development Nigel Dews, Australia Chief of Vodafone Hutchison said, "The opportunity to use our combined scale to enhance our customer service capabilities is an important outcome for the Vodafone Hutchison Australia merger."

Agencies

IBM, Google, Oracle, Microsoft suggest newspapers ways To generate net revenue

Some of the world’s most prominent technology companies are offering suggestions to publishers on how they can charge readers for news online.

IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and Google — a company some newspapers blame for helping dig their financial hole — responded to a request by the Newspaper Association of America for proposals on ways to easily charge for news on the web.

But building the infrastructure for charging readers is one part of the equation. The other part looks more challenging: getting publishers to make the leap and stop giving news out for free on the web.

Randy Bennett, the senior vicepresident of business development at the newspaper association, said his group initiated the process after a meeting of publishers in May near Chicago. A report that was posted online on Wednesday by the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard University includes 11 different responses from technology companies. Google’s proposal may be the most eyebrow raising, if only because the company — which aggregates thousands of articles from media outlets on its news pages — is so closely associated with the freewheeling ethos of an open internet.

Google proposed offering news organizations a version of its Google Checkout system, which is used for processing online payments. It would give readers a place to sign in to an account and then pay for media from a variety of sources without having to punch in their information over and over. And the company says it could offer publishers several pay methods, from basic subscriptions to socalled “micropayments” on a perarticle basis.

Along with the technology heavyweights offering ideas are tiny startups. CircLabs, run by just four people and incubated at the Missouri School of Journalism, is developing a program that would feed news from different sources into a bar across the top of web browsers. Martin Langeveld, the company’s executive vicepresident, said the application will offer both targeted advertising and the option of charging.

Agencies

Infosys set to acquire consulting firm for $200 million

Infosys Technologies Ltd, India’s second-largest provider of computer-services technology, may buy consulting businesses for as much a s $200 million to attract more clients, the finance chief said.

Infosys also may buy similar-sized businesses that process transactions, or information technology companies, Chief Financial Officer V Balakrishnan, 44, said in an interview in New York. The company isn’t in serious discussions with anybody, he said, declining to name potential targets.

“Acquisitions are a lot like love,” he said. “We’re not in love. We haven’t even started dating anybody.”

Infosys, which is projecting it’s first-ever decline in sales this fiscal year, is turning to new services to increase revenue in the worst recession since the 1930s. Building the consulting division will help the Bangalore-based company compete in the US against International Business Machines Corp, the world’s largest computer-services provider.

Infosys will look primarily in the US and Europe for purchases, said Balakrishnan. The company gets almost 90 per cent of its sales from North America and Europe. It aims to more than double domestic revenue to 5 per cent of total sales, he said.

‘Niche’ markets

The company’s American depositary receipts advanced 0.8 per cent to $47.21 in Nasdaq Stock Market trading yesterday. The shares have gained 92 per cent this year. Each ADR is equivalent to one ordinary share.

The company plans to invest in “niche” markets, such as health care, Balakrishnan said. Infosys isn’t interested in so- called captive units, processing divisions within a specific company, he said.

Infosys is in talks with five to six clients to buy their technology units, B G Srinivas, a senior vice president who heads the software provider’s operations in Europe, said in June. The company is in discussions with two customers in the US and three to four in Europe, he said at the time.

Sales will range between $4.45 billion and $4.52 billion in the year ending March 31, Infosys said on July 10, marginally increasing the lower end of its annual forecast for at least a 3.1 per cent revenue decline made in April. Infosys won’t be able to predict fiscal 2011 demand until clients complete their budgets in January, Balakrishnan said.

Infosys and top-ranked Tata Consultancy Services Ltd won orders from BP Plc, Europe’s second largest oil company, the Indian software providers said last month, signaling clients may be resuming spending on computer services. Infosys declined to give financial details while Tata Consultancy said it may receive as much as $100 million a year from the BP contract.

Agencies

$17 bn software exports for India's IT state

Defying the global meltdown, Karnataka earned $17 billion (Rs.74,929 crore) from software exports last fiscal (2008-09) as against Rs.60,800 crore the previous year, registering a 23 per cent growth in rupee terms and 21.5 per cent in dollar terms.

"The export performance of the IT industry in the state, especially Bangalore, demonstrates the knowledge sector remains unaffected by the global meltdown and decline in IT spending overseas," state Information Minister Katta Subbramanya Naidu told reporters here.

As India's tech hub, Bangalore accounted for Rs.72,506 crore or 97 per cent of the state's total exports, while the remaining Rs.2,423 crore are from tier-two cities such as Mysore, Mangalore and Hubli-Dharwad, registering 45 percent year-on-year (YoY) growth.

India's combined software exports -- spanning services, products and business process outsourcing (BPO) -- grew 21 per cent to $50 billion (Rs.2.22 trillion) as against $41 billion (Rs.1.84 trillion) in 2007-08.

Karnataka accounted for 34 per cent of the country's total software exports last fiscal.

"The growth is substantial especially in the current economic scenario. The state retains its top position in the sector, including exports," Naidu said.

Naidu said the state had set a target of $20 billion (Rs.1,000 billion) this fiscal.

Incidentally, the industry's representative body, National Association of Software Services and Companies (Nasscom), has forecast India's software exports this fiscal to be around $48-50 billion.

According to R. Rajalakshmi, director of the Bangalore chapter of the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), Karnataka's software export revenues are from the 1,200 firms registered with the STPI and software-related special economic zones.

Eighty-four software units will be set up in the state this fiscal, including 35 with foreign equity, two Indian majors and 47 small and medium enterprises, with a combined investment of Rs.465 crore.

In spite of voluntary attrition and lay-offs in the BPO sector, employment in the software industry in the state increased by 34,000 to 554,000 in 2008-09.

Agencies

Is LPOs set to yield $640 Million by 2011?

Legal Process Outsourcing (LPO) is a growing business segment and is expected to generate an income of $640 million by the year 2011. The industry is also expected to be the fastest growing outsourcing business, according to a report released by the research agency.

The findings based on ValueNotes maintains that India is expected to have a major share in this forecasted revenue from LPO, which will also open huge employment opportunities in India.

"LPOs are seen as a more stable career option than opportunities in the mainstream IT and ITeS sector.

Unlike other segments in outsourcing, the LPO segment has seen a robust growth even during recessionary times, thus providing a stable career option," said Lokendra Tomar, Chief Operating Officer, Asia-Pacific, Integreon, a LPO firm.

The LPO industry will be generating employment opportunities for all the lawyersincluding lawyers, graduates, freshers and MBAs.

Agencies