In its first corporate social report in 57 years of operations, the Pakistan Tobacco Company claimed here on Thursday that it was the "largest excise tax generator in the country, paying nearly Rs 50 million per working day. Over one million Pakistanis, the company said, was economically dependent on it.
Quoting from estimates for 2003 alone, the company said it had paid close to Rs 14 billion in excise and sales taxes to the government. It's net profits came to merely two percent of the revenue earned.
The 'Corporate Social Report' in the new parlance of the trans-national or multi-national economy is a new discipline to project the balance sheet of an enterprise, its operations and contribution to the service of a community.
The PTC, a trans-national arm of British American Tobacco Group in Pakistan - replaced the Imperial Tobacco Company of British India in 1947.
It has factories at Akora Khattak (NWFP) and Jhelum (the Punjab) and its leaf operation are certified ISO-9001 and 14001 putting it at the level of international standard.
A beautifully produced 100-page report in multi-colours and illustrated by urban and rural scenes, pictures of natural beauty spots, people of various regions and the cultural diversity they depict, the bird life, flora and fauna printed on the margin of each page is a comprehensive introduction of Pakistan for its national or international readers.
The PTC claimed a leading role in "harnessing the power of leading edge technology" to create a virtual organisation in this country. It owned one of the largest data networks and state-of-the-art business systems that helps make rapid and informed decisions.
The report, launched by PTC's managing-director and chief executive officer, Jeremy Pike before an assembly of a few legislators, fellow multi-national operators, local business and bank executives here on Thursday, said to answer its social responsibilities, the company had organised mobile medical units that toured rural communities at regular intervals.
It also had nurseries for distribution of a variety of plant saplings and also has planted directly some 30 million trees and "the count was still on".
In the field of agricultural, the report said the company had encouraged farmers to adopt modern practices and because of it tobacco growers in the NWFP have been able to increase the Virginia brand from of 861kg in 1948 to 2,400kg per hectare now.
This achievement compared very favourably with benchmark yields in the USA and Brazil and placed Pakistan as the 8th largest producer of flue-cured Virginia tobacco in the world.
Among other achievements, the report listed the introduction of polyethylene covered cultivation as protection against frost and dust, compound fertilisers, diesel water pumps and mechanical ploughing in most of the NWFP.
These initiatives had reduced land under tobacco but increased production to an exportable surplus.
In brief speeches, John Stoney, CEO of the ICI (Pakistan), and Pervez Ghias of ENGRO Chemicals lauded Pakistan Tobacco Company for its first corporate social report and hoped all major companies will follow the example and thus open a dialogue with their stakeholders.