Insurance academy gains recognition

The Chairman, Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation Ltd., Professor J. W. Wickramasinghe stressed the importance of the Insurance Academy when he met the President of the Insurance Institute of India, R. N. Tripathi during his visit to India.

The main objective of the visit was to discuss matters with regard to the affiliation of the Sri Lanka Insurance Academy with the Insurance Institute of India.

Prof. Wickramasinghe said that Insurance is a specialised field where technical aspects play a big role in a global context. Keeping this in mind, the Sri lanka Insurance Academy was established to train the staff of Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation in the technical aspects of insurance and develop specialised skills that are required such as customer care and salesmanship.

He added that the discussions held with the Insurance Institute of India were fruitful and they agreed to recognise the Sri Lanka Insurance Academy as an affiliated body.

The Indian Institute is affiliated to the Chartered Institute of London which is the recognised body in the field of insurance. As such the Lanka Academy would be permitted to conduct examinations in insurance. Certificates issued by the Sri Lanka Insurance Academy will be internationally recognised. The affiliation would also provide an opportunity to have exchange programmes as well as obtain updated world-wide research information which could be used for the betterment of the corporation, thereby achieving professional excellence.

Prof. Wickramasinghe stated that during their discussions, special interest was shown by officials of the Life Insurance Corporation regarding the 'Swarnajayanthi' Insurance Policy which was recently introduced by SLICL, as they would like to introduce it in India too.

Prof. J. W. Wickramasinghe was invited to deliver the key-note address at the International Convention of the Life Insurance Round Table 1998 on 'Globalisation of Insurance Industry'. There were over 200 delegates participating at this conference, from the Asia Pacific Region.

The other members of the delegation were Asst. General Manager (Fire), C. C. Jayasuriya and Manager/Training, P.A. Weerapokuna.

Quality control convention in October

The International Convention on Quality Control Circles ( ICQCC) will be held in Sri Lanka for the first time from October 27 to 29 at the BMICH.

The 1998 annual convention which is organised by the Sri Lanka Association for the Advancement of Quality and Productivity (SLAAQP) will include the presentation of over 50 papers and case studies by participants from Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, China, Phillipines, Singapore, Malaysia, India and Australia.

A pre-convention seminar by Ichiro Miyauchi , Counsellor of the Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers will be held on October 26 at TransAsia Hotel.

Post-convention industrial visits to a number of business ventures practising Quality Control such as Nestle, Noritake, Unichela and Great Western Tea Estate.

President of the SLAAQP, Sunil Wijesinghe said that 40 case studies and 20 papers have already been received for presentation. Mr. Wijesinghe observed that whereas other international conventions usually attracted about 1000 participants, this year's convention is expected to attract only about 300-400 foreign delegates and about 150 local delegates.

He attributed this to the Asian Economic crisis which had led to a number of South East Asian governments such as Malaysia and Thailand placing restricitions on overseas travel as well as the low financial performance of the private sector in these countries.

He however noted that a large number of participants are expected from India and China which had not been affected by the crisis.

ICQCC membership is confined to Asian states and includes Japan, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Phillipines,China , Taiwan, India and Sri Lanka.

The first ICQCC Convention was held in 1976 in Seoul while the last such Convention was held last year in Beijing.

Rubber Research Institute workshop

The Rubber Research Institute is organizing a three-day workshop for the executives and top managers of latex crepe rubber factories in Sri Lanka on installation of ISO 9002 quality system in crepe rubber factories.

This will be conducted in Dartonfield Estate by the Rubber Research Institute, which is the only ISO 9002 registered crepe rubber factory in the country so far. Representatives from 11 out of the 12 management companies have already registered for this workshop where the RRI officers are hoping to help the plantation managers on preparation of quality manuals and sharing the experience of installation of the quality system.

This will be a very important workshop for them to go ahead from the places where they have been stuck for the last several months.

All round training

At this workshop, they will be given an overall training on the quality system standard and also an extensive knowledge in documentation and implementation of ISO 9002 quality system pertaining to crepe rubber factories.This will develop confidence and motivation for implementing ISO 9002 quality system among planters and also enable them to share the practical experience gained in the process of obtaining ISO 9002 quality system by the officers of the RRI and Dartonfield Rubber Factory, with them.

Hemas diversifies its product range and mercy missions

By Feizal Samath

For Hemas, Sri Lanka's top-of-the-ladder healthcare conglomerate, some recent community service projects have done wonders for the staff in raising morale and creating team spirit.

"It was amazing. The goodwill and concern shown by the staff for disadvantaged fellow beings were unbelievable," said Mahanama Dodampegama, joint managing director of Hemas Pharmaceuticals.

In fact, about 100 Hemas staff supported a team of doctors to conduct a health and eye camp in the remote northeastern village of Kandegama at Aralaganwila - which has been attacked by Tamil rebels in the past. Over 1,000 residents were treated and at the eye camp, 43 patients with cataracts were provided with operation facilities and can now see.

Cash donations totalling Rs 75,000 were given to the local hospital for much needed equipment, to build a community hall and as assistance to a family whose breadwinner was killed by the rebels. The company undertook to pay the salary of the local montessori teacher, raising it to double the original amount, provided books, dry rations and clothing among other items.

At Hingurakgoda, during another goodwill project undertaken this time by Hemtours, peons and directors worked together to clean up an orphanage.

"We were searching for one of our directors to gift some presents to the kids. He was nowhere to be seen until someone spotted him climbing down from the roof where he had been doing some cleaning, " Dodampegama said, adding that no one pulled rank in this scenario. "From the peon to senior management, we were one team".

A largely low profile group, Hemas is coming out of its shell this year and discovering many things, including the goodwill nature of its staff and community participation.

There is a reason for doing so. Hemas was born in the year of Sri Lanka's independence from British colonial rule and is celebrating its 50th anniversary in December with a series of events including a meeting in Colombo of all its overseas clients and principals - about 100 in all.

Fifty years is a long time in the history of a company and just a handful of Sri Lankan-owned firms have the proud distinction of being born in the year 1948.

The firm was founded as Hemas Drugs by Sheikh Hasanally Esufally as a wholesale and retail chemist and druggist in Dam Street, still the hub of the wholesale trading centre in Colombo. Esufally, a Member of the British Empire, was a partner at the old trading firm of E.G. Adamally & Co but he had a vision of taking Hemas to great heights.

According to Imtiaz Esufally, managing director of Hemas Travels, the name Hemas originated from H.E (the initials of the last two names of the founder) Mother & Sons and soon Esufally acquired a piece of real estate in Fort and built the six-storey Hemas Building which is home to the group now and a landmark in the city.

The younger Esufally, one of the founder's five grandchildren who are in the business, said that from pharmaceuticals, the company branched into many other areas like toiletries.

Pharmaceuticals was the pioneering effort of the company but the biggest growth came from the consumer division in later years. "It is a real achievement in the Sri Lankan context where multinationals were dominating the market with toothpaste and baby care products. Every local company that tried to enter this segment were crushed by the multinationals," Dodampegama recalled.

Chipped in Neville Ruwanpathirana, the group's marketing director, who was also present during the interview with the Sunday Times: "We now dominate the baby care range of products with our Baby Cheramy product range while Clogard is the number two toothpaste in the market."

Esufally believes this is the greatest achievement for a Sri Lankan company-to stand up successfully against multinationals like Unilevers. "Even in India, companies like Unilevers have not allowed local companies to rise because of their powerful influence in the marketplace," he said.

Hemas Holdings (Pte) Ltd is the driving force of the group's 10-plus companies, providing the direction for strategic investment in identified areas of interest and identifying key sectors for investment in the future.

The group's eight-acre production estate at Welisara, just outside Colombo, has state-of the-art facilities for warehousing, packing drugs and stitching garments.

The company started with a modest stores and warehouse facility at Hendala in the formative years, using it as a testing ground for most of the group's industries. The old warehouse was converted to a cosmetics factory, and when the cosmetics factory shifted to the new site at Welisara, pharmaceuticals moved in. This natural cycle continued until consumer and garments also had their share of success at Hendala, before moving to Welisara.

Now all the facilities are housed at Welisara while the Hendala unit is still maintained. Quality has been the hallmark of the group that has around 2,000 employees on its payroll.

"Quality is an important yardstick in our operations. We are highly standardised, highly quality conscious. That has been the success of our group. We have not compromised on this and it has paid handsomely over the past 50 years," Esufally said, looking around the modest board room facility in the Hemas building in Fort.

The Welisara pharmaceuticals facility has got the ISO series standard and the garment factory has got a similar international quality standard. In the 1970s, when import restrictions came and hurt the company's pharmaceuticals operations, it went into the leisure sector and today Hemas Travels (inbound travel) and Hemtours (outbound) are market leaders in these two segments.

As the firm grew, the grandchildren of founder Esufally involved in the business set out to put their own stamp - bringing in new ideas and starting out on new sectors.

The younger Esufally, who is also a director of the holding company, said that though the founder's grandchildren were actively involved in the business, the group has grown to such an extent that each company has its own board of directors and a lot of responsibility given to non-family members who provide the professional flair the company needs.

Hemas Pharmaceuticals is the largest private sector importer of drugs and last year imported 400 million rupees worth of items out of a total 2.5 billion rupees worth of drugs that came into Sri Lanka.

It is also the first to install a blister packing machine, which packs a range of tablets and capsules. Multinational Smithkline Beecham, the makers of panadol, is the only other company that now has this machine while the State Pharmaceuticals Corporation and Astron (formerly Pzifer's) are also planning to import these machines, Hemas officials said.

The company's success is attributed to the challenges it takes in the face of negative situations. Dodampegama said that the company had often invested and pushed ahead with development plans during crisis periods, while other firms took a backseat.

"We have grown during crisis periods. Hemas became the number one pharmaceuticals firm in the aftermath of the 1983 riots. When others hesitated after a bomb blast in Colombo, we invested. During the height of the JVP insurgency in1989, we got the best foreign agencies," he said.

Esufally believes this is because Hemas has a lot of confidence in the country and its people. "This country has a lot of potential for growth. We take bold decisions like installing our new state of the art garments factory two months ago, when the East Asian crisis had crippled the plans of many."

Some of Hemas' well known brand names are Baby Cheramy range, eau de colognes, Clogard toothpaste, Goya, Pro-Sports, Dandex, Lakme, Godrej and Capri. Any plans to go public? "Not at the moment - the time is not ripe. We are considering plans to make it a public company but it may take some years as the stockmarket environment is not conducive to raise public funds for capital investment," said Esufally.

HDFC to cut red tape

The Housing Development and Finance Corporation will use the Internet to network its branches and in move to better compete with the private sector.

With people tending to stick to the traditional borrowing houses such as the SMIB, the NSB and commercial banks, the HDFC has turned to the latest technologies to improve its position in the housing loans market.

Unlike many other companies in the field HDFC has a decentralized system of disbursing its funds through a number of branches. Networking them through the Internet would enable the branches to operate independently, cutting back on administrative red tape. At present they have 17 decentralized branches operating througout Sri Lanka.

The corporation trains their employees here and in the HDFC India to provide a better customer friendly service. This has resulted in reducing the time taken to process loans from 4 months to 3 or 4 weeks.

For the 5 years HDFC has been in operation it has lent more than Rs. 2 billion of which 1.45 billion was contributed by the ADB and USAID. The ADB has been the main donor. Of the total loans, around 65% has been lent to the low income group, (income of upto Rs. 7500) at a concessionary rate of interest, primarily using foreign aid.

More than 90% of the total foreign funding available to all the lending institutions has been disbursed by HDFC alone. The remaining funds will be dispersed by the end of this month. Discussions are on the way for further funding.

Mahaweli Cement gets ISO standards

Mahaweli Marine Cement Co. Ltd. (MMCCL), the Swiss based Cement/Shipping Company owned by Lafarge of France and Blue Circle of the United Kingdom, was recently awarded the ISO 9002 certification.

The certification was done by the Bureau Veritas (BVQ) of the Netherlands which is accredited to the Dutch Council for Certification, with MMCCL's certification being conducted by BVQ's Regional Chief Executive for India and Bangladesh P.B. Warrier.

Established in 1828, BVQ is one of the world's leading certification bodies and is represented locally by Delmege Forsyth & Co. Ltd. who are the agents, while M. S. Gaur is the Senior Surveyor of the local office.

"The successful acceptance and integration of the Mahaweli brand of cement to the construction, asbestos and dealer market has allowed the company to claim a lead market share of over 30%" said Sjoerd Grueter, MD of MMCCL.

Mr. Grueter added that it was the stringent adherence to the organisation's Quality Policy that had led to their receiving the ISO 9002 certification.

"It is my duty to ensure that all employees fully understand the Quality Policy and that they strive to apply the Quality Policy to all aspects of the organisation's activities", said Mr. Grueter.

Mr. Grueter also said that periodic external audits will be carried out by BVQ every 6 months to ensure the company's adherence to the ISO 9002 standards, "however we ourselves conduct in-house internal audits every 3 months as the ISO certification can always be withdrawn if the standards set down are not complied with" he said.

Three new faces on UMLL Board

Chairman John Keells Holdings Ltd Ken Balendra and its Deputy Chairman, Vivendra Lintotawela have been appointed Directors to the Board of Directors of United Motors Lanka Ltd (UMLL). Atsushi Saruhashi, Director Vice Corporate General Manager, Office of International Sales of Mitsubishi Motors Corporation, Japan, Succeeds K. Okamoto on his retirement from the UMLL Board. These appointments took effect from August 20, 1998.

The present Board members are: M.J C Amarasuriya (Chaiman), G.A Hidelaratchi (Managing Director/Chief Executive), C. Wijenaike, Ms I.S Jayasinghe, Prof. J.W. Wickramasinghe and J.S Mather (Directors).

The correct figures...

A printer's devil had inadvertently crept into the story: 'SLIC chief for convention' on August 30.The figure of Rs 3 million as premium income of the Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation has dropped three zeros.

The correct figure should be Rs 3,000 million.

The other two figures accordingly are Rs 2,000 million and Rs 1,000 million.

The error is regretted.

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