The CSR policy of Grupo Ferrá reflects our corporate values. Our commitment to our team is exemplified by our pursuit of their professional development and continuous training. Furthermore, we strive to create a work environment presided by equality and a deeply felt respect for diversity. In this respect, we cooperate with companies dedicated to workplace integration of disadvantaged people, as well as with various NGOs working in the field of development cooperation.
On 6 November we attended the III CAEB Conference on Social Responsibility and Competitiveness where we were one of the companies granted the award "Committed Company, Company with values" in recognition of our participation the CSR actions promoted by CAEB.
Mrs Irene Villa was a keynote speaker at the conference, with an address entitled "Know that you can". She was also a moderator at several colloquia, with the participation of various social entities such as Asprom, Ikea, Red Cross, Projecte Home and Es Refugi, to name a few.
We were granted the opportunity to take part in the colloquium "Pass on, Converge, Achieve" with the Vicente Ferrer Foundation and some of the members of the group of business people who travelled to Anantapur on February of this year.
Grupo Ferrá wishes to congratulate CAEB on this excellent initiative and to thank them for the award.
In an interview for the Nivell magazine, of the Balearic Builders’ Association, our Marketing Manager talks about her experience in India.
What have you cooperated on?
As Grupo Ferrá’s designated manager in charge of the implementation of its Corporate Social Responsibility policies, I had been looking for a while for a trustworthy and transparent organisation that we felt we could trust. I had been given excellent feedback about the Vicente Ferrer Foundation (FVF – Fundación Vicente Ferrer), so I arranged a visit with them. After meeting the representative of the Vicente Ferrer Foundation for the Balearic Islands, Isabel Pizá, and starting to work together, I realised that I had finally found an organisation from which we could learn, and with which we could share experiences and grow in terms of corporate responsibility. Our company shares a common philosophy and core values with the Vicente Ferrer Foundation, which is essential when choosing your allies.
In July 2016 we started to support the Habitat project of the Vicente Ferrer Foundation, thus enabling the construction of homes for families belonging to the most disadvantaged sections of the Indian society and facilitating their access to dignified living conditions in a tiny village called Kogira, in the area of Penukonda, Madakasira region, in the country’s southeast. Getting involved in this home building project was a way of empowering women in India, given that the houses were registered in their names so that if they are abandoned by their husbands or widowed, no one can evict them from their homes, which unfortunately is a quite common occurrence in rural India.
After receiving the first report and the pictures showing the project’s implementation, we decided to renew our cooperation. However, we received a very unusual response from the Foundation, because Isabel Pizá told us: “Wait, before continuing your cooperation with us you need to travel to Anantapur to see the results of your solidarity first hand”. A few months later, a delegation from Grupo Ferrá flew to India in order to inaugurate the houses that we had built.
Getting to know and see the Foundation´s project with our own eyes, as well as the management transparency and everything else that we saw while on the ground was such a positive experience that it encouraged us to continue supporting the Vicente Ferrer Foundation and to remain at their side in the fight against the extreme poverty.
In July 2017 began new building work for the construction of houses in the village of Kanumpalli, in the Padini area, in northern Anantapur.
As an experience, what has it given you on a personal level?
The experience has been very enriching from all points of view, as well as an excellent opportunity for learning and transforming our company. Of course, it has also had quite a significant impact on a personal level, because getting in touch with other realities that are radically different from ours suddenly opens your eyes to new perspectives. It is not possible to see life again in the way that you did before.
Who has travelled to India on behalf of the Group?
Three members of the Grupo Ferrá team made the journey: Raquel Carrasco Barrio, Financial Director, Antoni Gurrera, Managing Director and me.
Will you continue this cooperation?
We have decided to renew our commitment with the Vicente Ferrer Foundation and, as I have mentioned earlier, we are participating in the construction of more houses that will restore dignity to the inhabitants of Kanumpalli. We are extremely proud to be able to make a contribution, however small, to give families in one of the poorest areas of southern India access to a better life, because what would be considered to be a fundamental right in our society for them is a real opportunity to escape extreme poverty.
Is this the first time that you have executed Corporate Social Responsibility project abroad? What is your Corporate Social Responsibility policy in the Balearic Islands?
We do not distinguish between global and local action. Our commitment as a company is to implement any guidelines and practices necessary that may lead to the achievement of economic, environmental and social balance. In this context, such a distinction would make no sense.
We have recently started cooperating with the company 3 Glops from Mallorca, dedicated to the occupational integration of persons with mental illness through a special employment centre. We have also cooperated with AEA Solidaria, an NGO created and managed by the staff of the airline Air Europa, by sending clothes to children at risk of social exclusion in the municipal district of Boca Chica, in the Dominican Republic.
This past month of February we had the chance to travel to Anantapur, India, for the inauguration of the dwellings that Grupo Ferrá has made possible through a partnership agreement with the Vicente Ferrer Foundation and also to find out more about the development programme that this non-governmental organisation is implementing there.
The project in India
We were actively seeking a solidarity initiative that was related to the Group’s action philosophy with the goal of thanking society for all the support we receive, and to also show that part of that support and of our customers’ trust in us can be transformed into opportunities for others. Thus, we took the decision to support the Habitat project of the Vicente Ferrer Foundation, enabling the construction of homes for families belonging to the most disadvantaged sections of the Indian society and facilitating their access to dignified living conditions in a tiny village called Kogira in the Madakasira region.
Our commitment has led us to get involved in this home building project as a way to empower women in India. In line with this goal, the Vicente Ferrer Foundation records ownership of these houses naming the women as registered owners in order to guarantee their right to continue living there indefinitely, thus preventing their eviction in case that they are abandoned by their husbands or become widowed, something which might seem obvious to us but that is not always the case in rural India.
Through this solidarity initiative we have participated in the building project of a colony in Kogira, and our contribution has consisted of providing three families with access their own house, which will protect them from high temperatures (which can sometimes reach 45ºC), from snake bites or scorpion stings, or from the monsoon season, for which purpose these houses have been built at a 60 centimetres elevation above ground level in order to prevent damage in case of possible torrential floods during the rainy season. Some of them are also adapted for disabled people.
The houses have been built with good lighting conditions, ventilation and the basic sanitary requirements. Water is manually collected from wells. Construction of this colony prevents the emigration of these families to large cities, where poverty becomes misery.
The Universal Declaration of Humans Rights sets forth in article 25 that everyone has a right to enjoy decent and adequate housing and with this initiative Grupo Ferra shows that we can all do our part in order to address this great challenge.
This initiative has been so positive that it spurs us in our desire to continue supporting this organisation, to walk hand in hand with them in their ongoing fight against extreme poverty, which is still a daily experience for too many people. We urge you to join us in the satisfaction that brings participating in a solidarity action. It’s important to remember that, as the Hindu thinker Mahatma Gandhi said: "The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problems".
The Vicente Ferrer Foundation has been working for nearly fifty years for the comprehensive development of the poorest and most disadvantaged communities of the Andhra Pradesh state. We encourage you to get to know them better and to try and find the most appropriate way in which you can cooperate with this foundation. You may find further information about them on the website www.fundacionvicenteferrer.org.
Act now! What you give is much less than what you get.
Grupo Ferrá has signed a partnership agreement with the Vicente Ferrer Foundation in order to finance the construction of 3 homes at a colony located in the village of Kogira, in the Madakasira region within the district of Anantapur.
This project aims to build colonies of dwellings for particularly disadvantaged families, who are currently forced to live in adobe huts that cannot withstand the high temperatures prevalent in the region and that are also easily flooded during the monsoon season.
Our goal is to offer these families decent housing incorporating basic habitable spaces, thereby improving the quality of life of dalit families, or families belonging to tribal groups and disadvantaged castes.
Grupo Ferrá has cooperated with AEA Solidaria in sending a shipment of clothes for children in risk of social exclusion living in the Municipality of Boca Chica in the Dominican Republic. AEA Solidaria is an NGO established by the staff of the airline Air Europa in February 2010 in the wake of the eartquake that devastated Haiti. At first it focused on donations of basic needs items for those affected by this catastrophe and at present it has extended its activities to India, Peru, Cuba, Ethiopia, Bolivia and the Dominican Republic. In Spain it supports community kitchens through food donations.
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