ABOUT Hindustan Unilever Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) is India's largest consumer goods company based in Mumbai, Maharashtra.

It is owned by the British-Dutch company Unilever which controls 52% majority stake in HUL. Its products include foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products. HUL was formed in 1933 as Lever Brothers India Limited and came into being in 1956 as Hindustan Lever Limited through a merger of Lever Brothers, Hindustan Vanaspati Mfg. Co. Ltd. and United Traders Ltd. It is headquartered in Mumbai, India and has an employee strength of over 16,500 employees and contributes to indirect employment of over 65,000 people. The company was renamed in June 2007 as Hindustan Unilever Limited. Lever Brothers started its actual operations in India in the summer of 1888, when crates full of Sunlight soap bars, embossed with the words "Made in England by Lever Brothers" were shipped to the Kolkata harbour and it began an era of marketing branded Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG). Hindustan Unilever's distribution covers over 2 million retail outlets across India directly and its products are available in over 6.4 million outlets in the country. As per Nielsen market research data, two out of three Indians use HUL products.

About the Lifebuoy brand

Lifebuoy has championed a message of health through hygiene consistently through a history that stretches back over 110 years. This message is more important than ever in many developing countries, where millions of lives can be saved simply by hand washing. Lifebuoy is one of Unilevers oldest brands; launched in the UK in 1894 as the first affordable soap, supporting people in their quest for better personal hygiene. Today, Lifebuoy is mainly sold in Asia and parts of Africa in fact, it is the market leader in every Asian market where it is sold. Nearly half of Lifebuoy brands consumption is in

rural Asia, where most of the population live on less than US$1 per day and hygiene issues like hand washing are vital to the health of the population. Lifebuoys vision is to make five billion people in the world feel safer and more secure by meeting fundamental health and hygiene needs. Partnerships play a central role in delivering this vision. Working with organisations like the WorldBank and UNICEF helps Lifebuoy to reach into new markets and change the behaviour of billions of consumers through joint initiatives promoting hand washing with soap. For Lifebuoy, the partnership activities go to the very heart of the brands ambitions and are, in every sense, vitality in action. These programmes bring benefits to everyone involved: they support the brands growth plans, enable Lifebuoy s partners to achieve their public health goals, and help people throughout the developing world to live with greater freedom from health problems. Unilever Values Unilevers mission is to add vitality to life. We meet everyday needs for nutrition, hygiene, and personal care with brands that help people feel golook good and get more out of life. As a multi-local multinational, Unilever aims to play its part in addressing global environmental and social concerns through its own actions, and working in partnership with stakeholders at local, national and international levels.

Honours for Lifebuoys Swasthya Chetna programme

Lifebuoy is the first brand to ever be honoured by the Indian postal department with a special Lifebuoy Swasthya Chetna postal cover, released to mark World Health Day. To mark World Health Day, on 7 April 2006, the Indian postal department released a special Lifebuoy Swasthya Chetna postal cover. Commenting on the occasion, Ms. K Noorjehan, Chief Post Master General said: "I am privileged to release the Special Postal Cover in recognition of the phenomenal work done by Lifebuoy. On the occasion of World Health Day, I urge all my brothers and sisters to take personal hygiene habits like washing hands with soap seriously. I congratulate Lifebuoy and Hindustan Lever for initiating and assiduously implementing this socially beneficial movement". The Department of Posts has a long history of honouring great personalities, institutions and monuments through commemorative postage stamps. A few events are

commemorated by the Department of Posts through the issue of a Special Postal Cover with special cancellation. Special Postal Covers are of great importance and philatelic relevance that have emerged as a vehicle to accord symbolic recognition to past and present events and to honour individuals, institutions and organizations. Lifebuoy is the first brand to receive this honour and recognition in India. About Lifebuoy and Swasthya Chetna Lifebuoys vision is to make 5 billion people feel safe and secure by meeting all their personal care and hygiene and health needs. In India, Lifebuoys Swasthya Chetna programme clearly demonstrates this commitment to purposeful action towards cleaner, healthier and more hygienic communities. Lifebuoys Swasthya Chetna programme is one of the largest sustainable direct contact programmes for hygiene education in the world. Started in 2002, the aim of the programme is to create awareness about disease causing germs and to promote basic hygiene practices like washing hands with soap as a preventive measure. To date, Swasthya Chetna has touched the lives of 70 million Indians across 18,000 villages, with its unique communication tools like flip chart stories, glow germ demonstrations, germ mask games, health rallies/message stenciling and other community activities. In 2006, the programme is being extended to an additional 10,000 villages.

Project Shakti
HUL has been proactively engaged in rural development since 1976 with the initiation of the Integrated Rural Development Programme in the Etah district of Uttar Pradesh, in tandem with the companys dairy operations. This Programme now covers 500 villages in the district. Subsequently, the factories that HUL continued establishing in lessdeveloped regions of the country have been engaged in similar programmes in adjacent villages.

These factory-centered activities mainly focus on training farmers, animal husbandry, generating alternative income, health & hygiene and infrastructure development.

Shakti is HUL's rural initiative, which targets small villages with population of less than 2000 people or less. It seeks to empower underprivileged rural women by providing income-generating opportunities, health and hygiene education through the Shakti Vani programme, and creating access to relevant information through the iShakti community portal. Shakti is a pioneering effort in creating livelihoods for rural women, organised in SelfHelp Groups (SHGs), and improving living standards in rural India. Shakti provides critically needed additional income to these women and their families, by equipping and training them to become an extended arm of the company's operation. Started in 2001, Shakti has already been extended to about 80,000 villages in 15 states Shakti already has about 25,000 women entrepreneurs in its fold. A typical Shakti entrepreneur earns a sustainable income of about Rs.700 -Rs.1,000 per month, which is double their average household income. Shakti is thus creating opportunities for rural women to live in improved conditions and with dignity, while improving the overall standard of living in their families. The model was piloted in Nalgonda district of Andhra Pradesh in 50 villages in the year 2000. The Government of Andhra Pradesh took the pioneering step of supporting the initiative by enabling linkages with the network of DWACRA Groups of rural women set up for their development and self-employment. Most SHG women view Project Shakti as a powerful business proposition and are keen participants in it. It has since been extended to in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Orissa, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamilnadu, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal with the total strength of over 40,000 Shakti Entrepreneurs. To improve the business skills of the SHG women, extensive training programmes are being held. Such workshops have already covered a large number of Shakti Entrepreneurs in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Tamilnadu, Chattisgarh and Orissa As part of their training programme, all HUL Management Trainees spend about

4 weeks on Project Shakti in rural areas with NGOs or SHGs. Assignments include business process consulting for nascent enterprises engaged in the manufacture of products such as spices and hosiery items.

Submitted by- Manan Modi Roll No 30