Interview with Irshad Khan, Head of Leaf Philip Morris Pakistan Limited

‘Continuously improving our social impact is vital for long-term success’

Irshad Khan is the head of Leaf Philip Morris Pakistan Limited. He joined PMI (Lakson Tobacco at that time) in 1994 in the Operation’s department. Over the years, he occupied various positions within the function; in 2008, he went on assignment as Manager Blend Management to Malaysia, and then later for a stint in Indonesia as Manager Leaf Buying. His extensive experience in the organization, both at the local and international levels eventually led him to occupy the position of Head of Leaf in 2018. Following are the edited excerpts of a recent conversation BR Research had with Irshad Khan:

BR Research: What is LEAF at PMI and what is your role?

Irshad Khan: Leaf is the core of PMI business across the globe where tobacco crop, environment and social sustainability are PMI Leaf key priorities. Philip Morris Pakistan’s (PMPKL) leaf operation in Pakistan is vertically integrated and fully aligned to PMI global sustainability commitments. Leaf operations is situated in Mardan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where our green leaf threshing facility (GLT) processes tobacco leaf for domestic and export markets after purchase from our contracted farmers. Generally, GLT process consumes significant amount of energy, however, in line with PMI’s commitment to reducing its carbon footprint, PMPKL has undertaken the conversion of boiler fuel at its GLT facility from furnace oil (high emissions fuel) to Liquified Petroleum Gas (LPG) which is a relatively cleaner fuel. This conversion initiative is expected to reduce the CO2 emissions by a staggering 30 percent which translates into a reduction of 2200 tons of carbon emissions in the next five years. In view of the agonizing shortage of furnace oil in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa this initiative would improve the resiliency of our operations by eliminating dependency on furnace oil. Additionally, PMPKL implemented venture furnace in tobacco curing barns with contracted farmers resulting in reduction in fuel wood consumption by 10 percent greatly helping tobacco farmers’ profitability and environmental impact.

Being the Head of Leaf at PMPKL, my role is to lead and ensure that our leaf operations in Pakistan are compliant with applicable laws and are fully in line with PMI’s global sustainability targets i.e. Crop, Environmental, Social, Occupational Health and safety standards.

BRR: How important is sustainability for a company’s growth?

IK: Sustainability is an integral part of our corporate strategy and it is a guiding principle for us. Sustainability is embedded in every aspect of our business from manufacturing our products to their distribution, achieving operational excellence, efforts to reduce the environment footprint of our business, driving inclusion and diversity, focusing on the employees’ wellbeing and the social uplift of our farmer’s community. We believe that sustainability is crucial for business success in long term. Our employees are our biggest asset and our strong focus on the wellbeing of our employees makes PMPKL as the employer of choice. These initiatives help increasing stakeholders’ trust and loyalty and ensure better business results.

BRR: Since CSR is also a part of sustainability strategy, can you name those who benefit from your CSR programs? What are your focus areas?

IK: Continuously improving our social impact within our operations and beyond is essential to our long-term success. In Pakistan our efforts focus on inclusion, environmental impact, sustainable livelihoods, education and empowerment of marginalized segments with sustainability at the core of our activities. Through our Leaf department, we have also focused on sustainable development of our contracted farmers and their families.

BRR: How did you cope with the pandemic? What were the extra efforts by you as your social responsibility?

IK: As the safety of our people is of utmost importance to us, we introduced several initiatives during the pandemic and helped our people to the best of our abilities. DuringCOVID-19, PMPKL initiated a project for keeping the families of our contracted farmers safe. Under this project, a COVID-19 safety kit containing masks, sanitizers and soaps were provided to 2,477 farmers. Mobile health care units were deployed across KP province to provide medical checkups, PPEs, and delivery of awareness sessions to people from identified areas impacted by COVID-19. Moreover, 20 free medical camps and health awareness sessions were conducted in Swabi, Mardan, Charsadda districts to provide health facilities check-ups and medications through which more than 1700 people were served. In addition to our farmer’s community, Covid support i.e. PPEs, sanitizers, awareness material etc. were also provided to our service providers- approximately 650 people through-out their engagement with PMPKL. Covid safety related messages were shared with contracted farmers.

BRR: In general, what is the significance of promoting gender equality at the workplace? What are you doing about it?

IK: Equality, especially gender equality, should be an integral part of any workplace. At PMPKL, we have taken several initiatives to promote inclusion and diversity not only at our workplace but for our communities as well. To facilitate our employees in pursuance of their career, flexible work arrangement program was introduced where employees have been provided the opportunity to either work remotely or on a hybrid basis i.e. a combination of working from home & the office along with flexible timings. PMPKL has also introduced power hours wherein our employees can attend to their personal commitments during working hours to help with their work/ life integration. Besides that gender neutral parental leaves were introduced for employees where our male and female employees are entitled to an equal number of parental leaves based on their caregiver status. The leaves can be utilized in any pattern and at any time suitable for the employee during the year. Further, the leaves entitlement go beyond biological parents including adoptive, legal guardian, step parent or parents through surrogacy.

PMPKL also introduced various initiatives aiming to improve employees’ wellbeing including the employees’ health coverage to include all procedures, therapies and medicines related to mental ailments and the facility of executive health checkups for all employees.

Building diversity, equity and inclusion into our workplace is at the heart of PMI’s culture. In order to provide an opportunity to women who have taken career break, Make Your Comeback program was launched by PMPKL. Through the platform the short-listed women were engaged in meaningful projects which match their experiences and aspirations while refining and building their skill set to enhance their future employability.

BRR: What are the limitations in addressing gender equality?

IK: We believe that costs might be one of the most common limitations that interfere with business objectives. Some common limitations in most organizations are the cost and clash with business objectives. However, companies who truly advocate for gender equity and for supporting equal progress and growth of both male and female employees must forge a strategic connection between their sustainability agenda and organizational culture. Companies also need to commit more than just financial resources to house a gender-equal workplace environment.

BRR: How do engage with employees on sustainability front?

IK: Our employees are drivers of change and the ambassadors of our purpose. Their dedication is essential to making our vision a reality. We have started our journey to regularly engage with our employees through different initiatives to create awareness on the importance of adopting sustainable practices in their lives.

BRR: How are you tracking or measuring Corporate Social Responsibility impact? What is the change that has occurred as a result of your commitment?

IK: To ensure that our strategy remains current and is able to best fulfill our stakeholders’ expectations, we keep assessing the priority are as that need our focus. As a result of our efforts, we have been able to create sizeable positive impact in the society we operate in. For instance, through our Crop Diversification Program, we were able to help farmers generate additional PKR 24000/- from these initiatives. Through our cleanup drives across all major cities of Pakistan and the waste bank initiative in leaf, we were able to collect more than 3,440kgs of trash which was then recycled in collaboration with our recycling partners. PMPKL has also worked on multiple energy saving initiatives at its site that have helped us in achieving 41 percent energy reduction compared with 2018 baseline. PMPKL has always been fully cognizant of its responsibility towards environment conservation. Since 2014/15, PMPKL has planted over 6.5 million trees which spanned over 1,865 Hectares across the districts of Attock, Swabi, and Nowshera & Charsadda. PMPKL currently is testing and promoting production of fast growing & high yielding tree species in Pakistan. PMPKL will continue stepping up its efforts on all fronts to contribute positively to people’s lives. We can only accomplish this by keeping our approach to sustainability at the heart of the way we do business.