Amru Rice is very honored and delighted to be recognized as a winner of the distinguished Inclusive Business award at the ASEAN Business Awards 2021. Amru Rice is the only one company from Cambodia being awarded in this categories along with 9 others companies from respective ASEAN nations. The event is organized by the ASEAN Business Advisory Council (ASEAN BAC) in Brunei which was held on November 30th 2021. This distinguished event is the stage of awarding to businesses contributing to the sustainable growth and prosperity of the ASEAN economy.
The award is not only meant for Amru Rice but for small scale farmers, agricultural cooperatives, NGO partners, donor agencies, development partners, supporters, government relevant institutions and ministries and Cambodia as a whole.
Amru Rice is recognized in the relevant and valued aspects and performance of the company that have been taken into consideration to ensure they met the stringent standards of the ASEAN Business Awards (ABA) evaluation process. The committee also stated that the evaluation was made possible from the result of a collaboration between the ABA committees, their strategic partners, the Preliminary Assessment Panel and ASEAN members state appointed Judges.
The ASEAN Business Awards (ABA) has been established for over 10 years and aims to recognize outstanding key enterprises that have contributed significantly to the ASEAN region. The ASEAN Business Awards’ annual ceremony is a prestigious event to honor outstanding businesses in Southeast Asia for their achievement in a number of categories. The awards ceremony provides an opportunity to celebrate resilience, innovation and creative solutions at a time of great challenge for companies in Southeast Asia.
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a commitment and practice within Amru Rice. It is the core ethic that guides our long-term interests for integrating economic, social and environmental impacts to our operations and helping out poor smallholder farmers in the process, as partners. CSR is our “everyday business” and we are strengthening this framework at the local level through contract farming with local farms on a sustainable agriculture partnership; through food standards certification model; through fair trade, and by multiple-stakeholder platform that draws in government incentives to poverty reduction, health, and nutritional status of smallholder Cambodian food producers.
Amru Rice’s CEO, Mr. Song Saran.
In 2021, Amru Rice renewed and expanded its contract farming agreement to now 82 Agricultural Cooperatives (AC) across Cambodia that directly benefited almost 10,000 farmer’s households, including indigenous people and poor farmers in the remote upland areas with very limited access to market.
Cambodian economic progress should be inclusive, with “No One Left Behind.” Our proven approach supports disadvantaged people by improved farmer livelihood through incentive price for organic rice, empowering farmers’ capacity, and productivity by 20% and raising income by 50% more than the normal conventional practices. The producer cooperatives in contract farming gain market sustainability and profit, while trained on soft skills and practical skills on organic standards, internal audit systems and financial and institutional records and management. Amru’s contract farming model creates positive systemic change by phasing out the greedy middle-men traders, growing certified safe foods and promoting sustainable agriculture that is climate smart, resilient, and eco-friendly. Rising numbers of farmer partners in this endeavour is proof of this positive systemic change.
Amru Rice installed solar energy in its storage warehouse in Kampong Thom province to help reduce greenhouse gas and carbon dioxide emissions. The company contributed 100 million riels to the National Committee for Disaster Management for seed distribution to 6650 famer’s households affected by flood in 2020 in Kampong Thom province. It provided a Rehabilitation Support Fund to 1000 households in 11 villages affected by flood and COVID19 to enable them to restore their income; each family received 5 kgs of rice, a box of fish can, and 120,000 Riels.
Amru Rice donated 150 liters of alcohol, 50,000 masks, 100 boxes of noodles, 12 cases of dried fish and 5 tons of rice from the Cambodia Rice Federation (CRF) to IDPoor households of Kampong Cham in May 2021 and rice and food supports for 6 months to 300 students at a primary school in Otdar Meanchey Province in November 2021. For promoting ethical business as a beneficial concept in the agriculture sector, Amru Rice is officially awarded “CRS’s Excellence Award” from AmCham on November 16, 2021. “The AmCham Award to Amru is not solely a corporate achievement, but a victory of our farmer suppliers who are moving forward the AMRU Rice Company’s CSR Plan of Action “ said Amru Rice’s CEO, Song Saran.
Amru Rice is very delighted to highlight one of our proudest achievement as receiving the certificate of recognition from American Chamber of Commerce in Cambodia (AmCham Cambodia) for our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities and suitability in 2021. The awarding ceremony is hosted by AmCham Cambodia on November 16, 2021, as AmCham’s annual Corporate Social Responsibility awards – highlighting the good work many of its member companies and investors do to give back throughout the year.
Amru Rice is One among the three category winners of judge’s special recognition on Amru Rice’s CSR and sustainability activities. Recently, Amru Rice is also featured by Khmer Times in the special edition of CSR insight in Cambodia, mentioned that “Amru Rice’s CSR brings prosperity to farmers’ Livelihood”.
The American Chamber of Commerce in Cambodia (AmCham CSR) hosted its annual Corporate Social Responsibility awards – highlighting the good work many of its member companies and investors do to give back throughout the year.
Anthony Galliano, President of AmCham said in his keynote speech the United States of America is a nation of giving and those traditions are carried on here by our members in Cambodia.
The awards were judged by three US nationals Lauren Higgins, Economic Associate at the US Embassy, Sabine Joukes, Chief of Party for the USAID-funded Women Entrepreneurs Act project, and former State Department diplomat and ambassador William Munroe.
The three judges selected 18 companies across three categories of awards: COVID 19, environmental and social impact awards.
Telecoms provider Cellcard (CamGSM) won the COVID 19 award for establishing a vaccination center that delivered shots to over 10,000 people as well as creating a pandemic information hub using social media platforms. Automotive, equipment, services and food brands RMA Group Cambodia was runner up.
Hotel operator Hyatt Regency won the environmental award for sourcing ingredients locally to lower their carbon footprint and also donations to a used soap to eco-banks to benefit disadvantaged communities. Hotel operator Rosewood Phnom Penh was runner-up.
Money transfer network and commercial bank Wing Bank won the social impact award after it funded free treatment at a children’s hospital and established a donation drive through its nationwide agents. Finance and insurance provider AIA (Cambodia) Life Insurance was runner up.
Including the three category winners, there was also a judge’s special recognition which was awarded to Amru Rice, Fourth Culture and Khmer Organic.
All 18 selected companies also received recognition certificates for their participation in the event.
