Financial
resultsBroad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE)
Today’s South Africans are citizens of a young democracy and everyone deserves a dignified and prosperous life. We know that meeting this expectation is not only morally right, but also commercially prudent. We have therefore aligned our efforts to the Department of Trade and Industry’s BBBEE Code of Good Practice to ensure that we contribute to a sustainable and equitable society.
In 2007, Massmart set and disclosed a target of achieving Level-Four BBBEE contributor status with a score of more than 70% by June 2012. This target was, in fact, exceeded when Massmart earned a Level-Three BBBEE contributor status and a score of 75.9% earlier for the measurement period July 2009 to June 2010.
The current score for the measurement period July 2010 to June 2011, whilst being aligned to our target is, at 72.89%, marginally lower than the Group's previous best score. This is attributable to a reduction in the Group's ownership score resulting from the profitable vesting of staff shares in the Thuthukani Staff Empowerment Trust.
BBBEE Scorecard December 2011 to November 2012
What we are doing to empower South Africans
We have focused on creating economic opportunities for our employees through their participation in the Thuthukani Employee Share Trust. Black employees own 8.2% of Massmart through this trust and have benefited from significant capital growth in their investment since the trust’s launch in October 2006. Many employees will, however, consider the R430.6 million paid out by the Thuthukani Staff Empowerment scheme when the Walmart transaction was completed as one of the most significant BBBEE milestones achieved by the Group.
We have established two enterprise development funds to help create sustainable livelihoods for unemployed black youths and rural women. The Massmart National Youth Development Fund creates opportunities for black unemployed youths by providing access to Hot Dog Café convenience food franchise opportunities at selected standalone stores. The Massmart WDB Rural Women’s Development Fund offers female entrepreneurs micro-loans to start up their own businesses in rural areas.
Massmart has undertaken two important initiatives aimed at educating black undergraduates and providing new black graduates with workplace experience. The Massmart bursary scheme awards five bursaries per annum to black commerce undergraduates registered to study in the commerce faculty at the University of Pretoria. Our Graduate Development Programme identifies and provides qualified but inexperienced graduates with access to a structured programme comprising practical work experience and related classroom training. A total of 177 Graduates have participated in this programme in the period January 2007 to January 2011.
We also believe that it is key to the success of empowerment that organizations advocate commitment to transformation amongst their peers and business partners. With this in mind Massmart consistently advocates compliance with the BBBEE Codes of Good practice to our supplier base placing particular emphasis on the Group’s top 400 suppliers. Our suppliers are, as a result demonstrating greater willingness to improve upon and share their BBBEE progress with Massmart.
