Intel chips in with society welfare work

Bangalore, June 8 (UNI) Intel seems not only comfortable with chips but also chipping in with its best for societal welfare with Company India President Frank Jones, Director-Corproate Affairs Rahul Bedi and other top executives and techies seen busy today building solid waste management units, tanks for rainwater harvesting and planting hundreds of tree saplings in a backward village near the city.

In an effort to enhance societal welfare through conservation of natural resources, Intel India and Children's Love Castle Trust (CLT) India joined hands to take up Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) work in backward and water-scarce Kurubarakunte Village, about 50 km from here.

Keeping up the spirit of the World Environment Day, about 200 Intel Employees, including their bosses, were involved in the work as part of CSR programme.

Soiled with cow dung and mud, Mr Jones walked straight to speak to the visiting newspersons after working on a compost tank, where he helped his staff in filling the six-foot pit with cow dung, leaves and earth.

He said the community driven programme, for which Intel was annually spending nearly one billion US DollarS, had been taken up in nearly 60 countries.

''Nearly 75 per cent of our employees participate in such programmes and we take up employee survey from such activities.

''This is voluntary work and this is how we try to give back something to the country where we work. For every 20 hours spent by an employee, the Intel management contributes 50 US DollarS for such community work,'' he added.

He said Intel had taken community works in Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu and in Mumbai and Delhi as well where the company had exists.

Mr Jones said Intel had trained three million teachers in the backward areas in honing their skills and this included seven lakh teachers in India.

''We want to train ten lakh teachers in the next five or ten years. We are also offering scholarship to students from rural India and have sent eight children on international student programmes abroad.

Mr Bedi said Intel India was focussed in enhancing the lives of people by helping them provide a fair opportunity of education, improved healthcare as well as undertaking various community welfare initiatives.

UNI