The Asia Responsible Enterprise Awards (AREA) 2023 is pleased to honor 78 outstanding business leaders and enterprises for championing sustainable and responsible business practices. Presented by leading regional NGO Enterprise Asia, the AREA is the most reputable award recognition program recognizing organizational efforts in creating a culture of compassion, integrity, and in being socially responsible corporate citizens. The AREA serves as a badge of excellence to spur further innovation and best-practice sharing for your organization and the world at large.
Bai Mai Pun Suk Foundation was among the recipients who were conferred with the Social Empowerment Award. The “Bai Mai Pun Suk Foundation” was established by Bangchak Corporation Public Company Limited (Bangchak) in 2017 to engage in social missions aligned with the Sustainability Development Goal (SDG) 4: Quality Education at its heart.
The “Bai Mai Pun Suk Foundation” was focused on three areas of literacy and education development, which are enhancing youth education efficacy, promoting responsible consumption of resources and environmental consciousness, and improving well-being. Three education and environmental initiatives were organized, called “Read and Write with Ease” to achieve youth education, “Ruk Pun Suk Junior” to spread environmental consciousness, and “Solar Pun Suk” to promote well-being improvement.
The foundation is committed to addressing the issue of illiteracy through a systematic approach to practical teaching that helps teachers better transfer knowledge to their students. The foundation aims to enhance students’ literacy skills by realizing their age-appropriate learning potential while fostering their environmental consciousness and sustainable energy practices that are aligned with a low-carbon society.
It was discovered that teachers across the country were reporting incidents of child illiteracy with varying degrees of severity, regardless of if the schools were in cities, economic zones, or remote areas. This is the result of the archaic teaching methodology commonly used to teach Thai which hinders student learning. The foundation is focused on mitigating the issue at the root cause by implementing a 4-step teaching program (Testing, Training, Monitoring and Support, and Evaluation). Schools that successfully address these illiteracy issues are then offered further assistance to address environmental and energy issues to foster sustainable development skills via “Ruk Pun Suk Junior” and “Solar Pun Suk” campaigns.
Teacher-student participation satisfaction statistics show that more than 90% of participants were satisfied and happy to join the activities, with more than 17,000 teachers and students benefiting from the programs. Educational development efforts also led to satisfactory student performance, post-program assessments found that more students were able to read and write, and were happy to engage in more complex subjects. As there was a resulting higher academic performance, schools are now willing to expand on the new teaching concepts and, thus, become role models for other schools in the education network. The latter role includes becoming a community learning center, distributing information on waste management, agricultural management, and solar energy application for rural agricultural areas.
Using SROI (Social Return on Investment) tools, the investment ratio per benefit was 1:1.19 indicating that investment in basic education significantly affects educational institutions and students positively.
The “Bai Mai Pun Suk Foundation” intends to maintain the quality of the programs in target groups by expanding clear “role model” approaches and practices for all three programs. Work is also in progress to expand the scope of operations to provinces with below-average academic performance to improve performance and rectify educational issues for children at the grass-root level. Finally, the foundation will be developing a digital platform for future programs to serve as a more effective communication channel between the foundation and its partnered educational institutions.
About Enterprise Asia
Enterprise Asia is a non-governmental organization in pursuit of creating an Asia that is rich in entrepreneurship as an engine toward sustainable and progressive economic and social development within a world of economic equality. Its two pillars of existence are investment in people and responsible entrepreneurship. Enterprise Asia works with governments, NGOs and other organizations to promote competitiveness and entrepreneurial development, in uplifting the economic status of people across Asia and in ensuring a legacy of hope, innovation and courage for the future generation. Please visit https://www.enterpriseasia.org/ for more information.
About Asia Responsible Enterprise Awards (AREA)
The Asia Responsible Enterprise Awards program recognizes and honors Asian businesses for championing sustainable and responsible entrepreneurship in the categories of Green Leadership, Investment in People, Health Promotion, Social Empowerment, Corporate Governance, Circular Economy Leadership, Corporate Sustainability Reporting, and Responsible Business Leadership. For more information, visit: https://enterpriseasia.org/area/.