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ITC moves to Triple Bottomline Reporting

Suhit Anantula of World is Green writes about ITC @ WorldisGreen.com » ITC moves to Triple Bottomline Reporting

ITC has made another new feather to its cap. ITC at one point of time was fighting criminal charges . Once YC Deveshwat decided that tobbaco industry is not the right industry to be or atleast make it a major focus of the company ITC has undergone some major changes.

From its first move to hotels, it has diversified into clothing, agarbatis, safety matches, greeting cards, FMCG products and the most famous of them all the e-Choupal rural initiative.

As I commented sometime back on Businessworld :

This is one of the most important developments in India. ITC has definitely understood the game and is building the platform to distribute and provide goods and services to 70% of the Indian population. It is important to remember that Walmart has grown by targetting rural America¸ Sears before that was successful by targetting the rural farmer in America. India needs atleast 2000 of these malls in the coming 5-8 years and ITC is the only company which seems to have understood the importance of building this platform. Look out for ITC!

Now ITC has taken a step forward and will start Triple Bottomline Reporting of its divisions.

ITC Ltd’s individual divisions are expected to move over to Triple Bottomline Reporting, a new benchmark for high-aspiring corporates globally, from this financial year, even as the tobacco and hotel major is close to becoming a water-positive company.

“Keeping in with the spirit of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), we are looking beyond mere financial reporting, beyond the balance sheet and profit and loss account,” ITC executive vice-president for Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) Subash Rustagi told PTI here today.

Triple bottomline reporting is the basis on which a company’s balance sheet would also show how it has deployed environmental and social capital. A corporate, apart from its net profit and revenues, would also report on also environment, health and safety under Triple Bottomline.

ITC Farming, ITC Agriculture and IT divisions are the others which are expected to begin Triple Bottomline Reporting from this year, he added.

ITC group, which had been reporting its results under Triple Bottomline since the last fiscal, is also edging close to becoming a water-positive organisation, he said.

The company’s fresh water ingestion fell 6.6 per cent in 2003-04 to 22.48 million kilolitres from 24.10 million KL the organization drew during the 12-month period of FY’03, he said.

The volume of treated effluent discharged was 14.04 million KL in 2003-04, as against 14.64 million KL during the previous year.

Has all these initiatives helped the company. Very much. ITC has become the most valuable FMCG company in India.