SOCIETY

We consider our society to be, ﬁrst and foremost, the Kenyan people, and then the broader regional and global community within which we operate. We take pride in being a responsible corporate citizen and productive member of Kenyan society. We remain committed to working closely with Kenyans to be a respected and empowering contributor to the social and economic development of the country. We acknowledge that the society that surrounds us is an integral part of who we are and what enables our success, providing us with a conducive operating environment and a market for our products and services.

We refreshed our brand during the year and our new promise of “twaweza – when we come together, great things happen” epitomises the spirit of collaboration and parthnership with which we seek to participate in Kenyan society.

OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH KENYAN SOCIETY

We take our broader corporate role and responsibilities very seriously and consider every Kenyan citizen to be a member of our society. As a result, the needs and expectations of our society extend beyond those of our customers and include: safeguarding the natural heritage of the nation and operating in an environmentally friendly manner; partnering with government, communities, NGOs and individuals to empower and uplift our fellow Kenyans; providing access to health, education, empowerment and agricultural services; as well as providing access to transformative mobile communications solutions.

Our relationship with Kenyan society remained positive during the year, despite the turmoil brought about by the prolonged electioneering period and the call for a boycott of our services.

CREATING SHARED VALUE

We deliver value to the Kenyan society within which we operate on an ongoing basis as a top Kenyan tax payer and employer, and by engaging and empowering groups and individuals throughout the country in a variety of diverse ways.

The services we provide through our network enhance and transform the lives of Kenyans every day, we also invest in communities directly, and have an active Corporate Social Investment (CSI) programme through the Safaricom and the M-PESA Foundations.

Along with these ongoing channels, a few of the speciﬁc ways in which we have delivered value to Kenyan society during the year included:

Award-winning health payments solution bringing healthcare to one million low income earners

M-Tiba has continued to grow at a rapid rate and now has just under one million active users, who are able to receive treatment at over 400 accredited medical facilities in the Nairobi, Mt Kenya, Western and Nyanza regions, and who have redeemed more than KES 200 million on healthcare to date. M-Tiba is a health payments solution with an ‘e-wallet’ that enables low-income earners to save towards their healthcare expenses and helps donors to target funds accurately and conﬁ dently. M-Tiba was awarded the ‘Shared Value’ award at the 2017 Loeries Awards for creative excellence in Durban, South Africa, and the ‘Achievement in Sustainable Development’ award at the FT/IFC Transformational Business Awards in London, England, in June 2017.

Harnessing mobile technology to transform farming

DigiFarm is a platform that provides smallholder farmers with convenient access to a variety of services, including discounted inputs, ﬁ nancing and advice on best farming practice: all from the comfort of a mobile phone. We are delighted to report that 700,000 farmers registered on our DigiFarm platform during the year, with over 200,00 using the service daily and 7,000 successfully taking out loans to assist with purchasing high-quality seeds, fertilisers and pesticides. Based on this immediate success, our target is to register 1.4 million farmers on the platform by December 2018. DigiFarm offers smallholder farmers access to a suite of information and ﬁ nancial services, including discounted products, customised information and tutorials on farming best practices, and access to credit and other ﬁ nancial facilities. The service has also been expanded through the addition of our Connected Farmer solution to enable farmers to share information, such as expected yields with processors, and to transact through seamless M-PESA payments.

Supporting educational outcomes in Kenya

More than 2,800,000 learners and 40,000 teachers across Kenya are now using our SMS, USSD and web-based education platform, Shupavu291. The platform provides lessons and quizzes to primary and high school students, who can also search for information and access Wikipedia summaries without an internet connection. The popular service also includes an Ask-a-Teacher feature, through which students can ask a qualiﬁ ed teacher questions remotely. Over 60 million questions have been exchanged on Shupavu291 and users have been found to score 22.7% higher than the national average for their standard. Students can register for the service by dialing *291#. Shupavu291 won the ‘Best Mobile Innovation for Education’ award at the 2018 GSMA Global Mobile (GLOMO) Awards.

B Team keeping sustainable business on the leadership agenda

The B Team – Africa continued to gain momentum during the year and was formally launched at the Africa CEO Forum in Abidjan in March 2018. The B Team – Africa is an alliance of progressive business leaders who want to empower Africans by helping to create more sustainable and just economies across the continent. The purpose of the alliance is to assist each other by sharing ideas and resources.

Computer labs for primary schools

The 47-in-1 initiative is our programme to roll out computer labs to at least one primary school in every county in Kenya. Computer labs are a proven way of providing students with access to digital learning environments and tools.

The computers in each lab are pre-installed with learning software customised to the school syllabus and training is facilitated to ensure sustainability of the project once handed over to the community.

To date, we have deployed 17 labs and our target is to launch another 20 labs by the end of FY19.

Chapa Dimba na Safaricom

The Chapa Dimba na Safaricom Football Tournament aims to recruit young talented footballers, aged between 16 and 20 years old, to play in a national tournament, showcase their talent, and enjoy an opportunity to earn from their passion by winning the overall prize money worth KES 1 million and an international training camp opportunity. Over 1,600 teams from across the country registered for the ﬁ rst season, which saw Kapenguria Heroes from Rift Valley and Plateau Queens from Nyanza emerge as champions during the national ﬁ nals held at the Bukhungu stadium in Kakamega. Thirteen players from the ﬁ rst season were called up to the national under 20 team while another six have been snatched up by various Kenya Premier League clubs.

New strategy aligns Safaricom Foundation investments to SDGs

We continued to transform lives throughout Kenyan society through the investments of the Safaricom and MPESA Foundations. This year, the Safaricom Foundation developed and launched its three year strategy for the period 2018-2021. As part of the new strategy, each of the trustees of the Foundation will now provide oversight and stewardship for the respective pillars of the strategy. Based on a rigorous assessment of where the investments of the Foundation can be most impactful, the new strategy also clearly links the investments of the Foundation to the SDGs.

The Foundation will focus on the three areas of health (SDG 3), education (SDG 4) and economic empowerment (SDG 8) over the next three years. As well as continuing with its ongoing philanthropic grants, the Foundation will proactively co-create ﬁ ve new programmes with its partners based on speciﬁ c SDG targets.

Safaricom Foundation focus areas and beneﬁciaries

* Number of beneficiaries (individual people benefiting from programmes in the related focus areas)

† This category includes spend on areas such as Technology for Good, arts and culture, and pass on grants.