The rewards of corporate social responsibility aren’t always apparent when a company is looking to implement new initiatives. Helping the community or environment are obvious goals, but for a thirty-seven-year-old veteran manufacturer of ready-made garments such as Posh Garments Ltd, it’s firstly about the positive impacts within the company. Factors such as employee participation or brand reputation play a part in the goals of initiating a wholesome approach to the company’s internal growth strategy.
In the month of February, Posh Garments management and employees banded together for a blood grouping program for its employees of the manufacturing unit. Though there was no pre-requirement, all the employees were encouraged to participate. With a little inspiration amongst departments, the event turned out to be a big blood grouping drive as seven hundred and ten samples were collected. 710 people benefited within the span of two days to have their tests done for verification and confirmation of their blood group.
Nine clinically significant blood group system types are found in humans, giving the correct blood to a patient during a transfusion is vitally important. This means making sure that the donor’s blood is compatible with the patient’s blood, to minimize reactions during a transfusion and avoid any catastrophic consequences. The accurate grouping of blood is very important when it comes to having a blood transfusion. If blood is given to a patient that has a blood type that is incompatible with the blood type of the blood that the patient receives, it can cause intravenous clumping in the patient’s blood which can be fatal. The patient’s body can start producing antibodies that attack the antigens on the blood cells in the blood that was given to the patient, causing reaction and rejection. For example, a patient who is blood group B has naturally occurring Anti-A antibodies in their blood plasma. If this (blood group B) patient receives blood group A red cells, the Anti-A antibodies in the plasma of the patient will cause the blood group A red cells to clump intravenously (within the veins), which is life-threatening. Similarly, a patient who is blood group A has naturally occurring Anti-B antibodies in their blood plasma. If this (blood group A) patient receives blood group B red cells, the Anti-B antibodies in the plasma of the patient will again cause the blood group B red cells to clump intravenously which poses the same life-threatening risks.
This program was conducted by BSCI (Business Social Compliance Initiative). Fifteen of their members came for the program. BSCI Audit is designed to set a harmonized social responsibility monitoring system for business sections in European countries. Posh Garments has many buyers and well-known retailers based in Europe. The BSCI Audit is suitable for checking a set of social compliance monitoring systems initiated by the European Foreign Trade Association. These programs held in Bangladesh not only allow the members of the factory to be benefited but the entire society as a whole.
For Posh Garments, the key purpose of this blood grouping program was to ascertain the correct blood group for individual employees of Posh Garments and to provide emergency blood donation service internally or to the public blood banks within our country. The majority of the operational members of the manufacturing facility never had their blood group tested, as it is expensive and didn’t have the need to do so. If any of them require an emergency blood transfusion, our management can check from our central database and help to provide the respective group of blood at the earliest. Especially in this current Covid-19 pandemic, thousands of people require blood daily and it would be tremendously helpful if Posh Garments has an opportunity to give help the community as well. It would strengthen employee connections and set the standards of the company’s culture to give back.
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