As a Fellow of the Frimpong Manso Institute, I was invited to the 33rd Thanksgiving Service of the First Sky Group last Sunday. I saw Christianity on display. No, I didn’t see it in the large assemblage of pontiffs or the outpouring of prayer and gospel music.
There, at the International Conference Centre, I saw the operationalisation of the Bible’s definition of true Christianity, that “real religion is reaching out to the homeless and loveless in their plight”
The First Sky Group started in 2002 with a workforce of three personnel in a 4×4 office in Accra. It now has a workforce of 4,000 employees working in First Sky Commodities Limited (processing 25,000 metric tonnes of cocoa annually) First Sky Bitumen Processing Limited, Volta Serene Hotel, Western Serene Hotel, Serene Insurance Company Limited, Frerol Rural Bank and First Sky Energies Limited, among others.
This write-up is not an advertisement for the Group. I was impressed with its Corporate Social Responsibility. The Group invests 30% of its profits after tax as funding for interventions that support the poor and it invests in health and the spread of morality.
Ever since 2016 when the Group decided to adopt the Korle Bu Renal Dialysis Unit, it has paid GH¢36 million to give free dialysis to kidney patients. It has sponsored kidney transplant surgeries for 16 patients suffering from chronic kidney end-stage diseases.
It has gone further, contributing to the establishment of West Africa’s first modern Kidney Transplant Centre in Ghana.
Based on his knowledge that the human kidney continues to function 24 to 36 hours after death, the Group’s Chairman, Eric Seddy Kutortse is currently at the forefront of a strong advocacy for legislation that will legalize the harvesting of kidneys from fresh corpses to save lives.
For the spread of morality, the First Sky Group has built legacy churches for the Assemblies of God Church. So far 72 chapels have been built across the country and the sod has been cut recently for the construction of 50 church buildings and 50 two-bedroom mission houses in different locations in rural Greater Accra, dubbed Legacy Temples Project.
What melted my heart was upon being told that the Group has, since 2023, invested in the production of solar energy. Its first solar plant, in Yendi, sits on a 140-acre land filled with solar panels to harvest 50 megawatts of renewable power- the first of its kind in Ghana. It is second only after the 55-megawatt Bui solar power project.
As I sat watching, listening, praising and applauding, I began to count the number of other Ghanaian companies which are transforming lives with their core business and CSRs.
I remembered the Despite Group’s $200,000 donation to the Covid-19 Fund. This is the Group that is credited with the revolution that indigenised language on radio – through Peace FM, among others
I remembered Zoomlion Ghana Limited, the largest waste management company in Ghana, with a workforce of 40,000 Ghanaians operating in all 16 regions through MMDAs. Part of the Jospong Group, Zoomlion has a CSR that is peculiar and well-targeted.
Peculiar in the sense that although it earns money from collecting and processing dirt, its CSR teaches people to create less dirt. I am particularly impressed that strategically, it has targeted children.
From 2014 it initiated the Zoomkids School Recycling Project. To divert most plastic waste and save water bodies, it gives out waste bins and recycling bags to the schools. It also sensitises the population about plastic waste. But it is not all talk; tonnes of plastic waste have been collected for recycling from the schools in a nationwide movement.
In 2016, the company implemented a nationwide Zoomkids Sanitation Quiz competition to test the level of appreciation for sanitation literacy among schoolchildren. The ultimate winner was sponsored on an all-expenses paid trip to Dubai.
In 2016, Zoomlion initiated the Zoomkids Experiential Learning Project, using excursion trips. Students from both SHS, Primary and JHS went on trips to various waste management industries,  including Zoomlion Head Office, the Accra Compost and Recycling Plant, Universal Plastic Products Recycling, Sewerage Systems Ghana Limited and Lavender Hill.
The third CSR programme which I find admirable is that of Tobinco Group.
Some may see Entrance University College of Health Sciences as a business; I choose to call it CSR. Affiliated to Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Entrance is the first private university in West Africa to offer the Doctor of Pharmacy degree. Through this CSR, pharmacy practice, like a cell, multiplies and sub-divides, spreading knowledge and health care.
The Group also has, since 2020 established the Tobinco Pharmaceuticals Training Institute which trains Medicine Counter Assistants. Accredited by the Ghana Pharmacy School, it is a six-month certificate course in Medicine Counter Assistantship
Founders of all these companies, being highly religious, know that “faith without works is dead”.
DISCLAIMER: The Views, Comments, Opinions, Contributions and Statements made by Readers and Contributors on this platform do not necessarily represent the views or policy of Multimedia Group Limited.