About the foundation:

Our Roots:

KASB has come a long way from its roots as a cotton brokerage and securities trading firm in the last five decades, to become a diversified financial services conglomerate today. Our 50 years of banking experience have provided us with a firm foundation that allows us to constantly look ahead whilst not forgetting our past.

KASB also actively supports higher education institutions such as LUMS, recognizing the integral importance of educating our children to develop and equip them to lead us ahead.

How foundation works:

Our belief is in education and that’s why we set up an educational institution, the Khadim Ali Shah Bukhari Institute of Technology (KASB IT) is the first private corporate sector institution of higher education in the field of computer science and information technology (IT).

We should be proud to shout that ours is the first institution in Pakistan which is offering a curriculum for specialisation in alternative energy sources like wind, solar and thermal power, but that’s not our style. We’re simply proud that we are doing more that just contributing, we are providing a platform.
We do what we can, where we can, and we are excited that our Group recently became involved with The Human Development Foundation (HDF).

Although a pilot project at this stage, the Digital Study Hall (DSH), which uses digital video to disseminate targeted knowledge and skills training, shares the best practices of experts in different fields which are captured on digital video, and these DVDs are provided to schools and other institutions. These videos will be made available on the Internet for anyone to download, free of charge.

The DSH model will have dual benefits of being:

1) An effective student study aid
2) A teacher training aid

The first HDF pilot program of DSH will cover four (4) topics:
1) Children’s Education
2) Basic healthcare training (example: basic hygiene)
3) Social mobilization (example: how to train and educate communities in self help)
4) Vocational training (example: basic plumbing skills, electrician skills)

This first step may seem modest, but it is a critical step toward HDF’s developmental goals and we’re proud to be involved.

Our Inspiration:

We see a lot of potential in Pakistan – not just in people, but also our surroundings.Looking towards the future we imagine the impact that education will have. The coming generation will be allowed to compete with the rest of the world and advance rapidly. We have a nation of talented people and the resilience and determination of those that strive to seek knowledge and attain betterment is a great example which shows how we can excel in a world of global competition. Only, many cannot get past the daily challenges that life throws at them. We live in a world where expectations are high; we live in a world where we are all too busy. We live in a world where everyone deserves the right to be able to talk to another person, confidently, where they can listen to the news items and make rational judgements, where they can make decisions because they have an understanding.

This is more than just helping our country leap ahead of other developing countries.

Actually we’re no different to other businesses – we are employing people, selling products and services, we have a global presence and we think about profit. 
What we do differently though is our approach to CSR. We do not have a formal CSR agenda - yet. That’s to say we just do it. It’s our way of life, and that’s what we have been doing, working on initiatives and projects, but we are now mapping CSR across the various businesses that our part of our Group.
We know the difference CSR can make we can see it in the initiatives we are involved in.  But we need to conduct a 360° CSR view of our organisation, mapping the CSR stakeholder experience end to end, only then do we see the real CSR experience and its impact.

We are already developing a CSR culture aligning people, processes and systems to CSR thinking.
The task that lies ahead is identifying value add CSR steps to success, building and presenting the business case to our suppliers, and customers.
We are never satisfied with just doing one thing and that’s probably why we set up the Foundation. It gives us an opportunity to do more.
But we are not there yet. We want to do much much more. And that’s actually what makes us different.

Community Development Activities:

In 2003, the KASB Group (in collaboration with a local football Club, Karachi United FC) started the KASB Karachi Premier League (“KASB League”). The idea behind the initiative was three-fold: (i) to provide underserved communities with a healthy outlet thereby working on the community development mandate; (ii) promoting football; and (iii) setting up a proper league system within which both the above two objectives could be achieved.

The first edition of the KASB League was played on a single league basis and saw 10 teams participating, of which 8 were inner city Clubs. It was the first Club league in which teams played for prize money and were also provided with equipment, gifts (such as clocks and other household items) and other prizes. In fact, at the time, the KASB League was launched, there wasn’t even a National League in Pakistan, which commenced subsequently.

Subsequently, in the following years, the teams were expanded to 16 (15 inner city) and that continued till the fourth season. In all these years, KASB not only continued to distribute gifts, prizes and handsome cash awards but also picked up all administrative and marketing costs including referees, match commissioners, ground staff, workers etc.

It is pertinent to point out that in Pakistan, the way the football hierarchy is structured is that the parent body is the Pakistan Football Federation and under the same come the Provincial Football Associations who in turn supervise the District Football Associations. Karachi, the biggest city of Pakistan and the commercial hub is divided into five Districts. There are over 450 football Clubs registered in Karachi with their respective District Associations and most of these are from the inner city i.e. underprivileged areas. In the past, especially the 1950s and 60s, Pakistan football was of a good standard especially in Asia and players from these underprivileged areas (such as Lyari) were some of the top players in Asia. Hence football was there livelihood. However, since that time, not only has Pakistan football regressed, lack of funding available with the local Associations has meant that football and consequently footballers have suffered.

With a view to revive the fortunes of the players/officials and to avoid scenarios like the one in Lyari where promising football players have turned to gun-running and being parts of violent criminal gangs, the League was set up to a platform for social/community development. The aim being not only providing  an avenue for healthy expression/entertainment but with a long term view of providing finances, in some shape or form to these players.

Whilst setting up an elite league featuring the best players and teams is always part of the football part of the mandate, in the fifth season, it was recognized that many teams, players and officials were still not reaping the benefits of the social mandate. Hence the League was further expanded to 20 teams and in addition, KASB (together with Karachi United and the local District Associations) hosted five separate District Championships featuring over 248 teams. Once again, all costs of the League and District Championships were borne by KASB, right from cash prizes, individual awards, ground booking costs, ground maintenance, ground set-up, workers, referees, assistant referees, match commissioners etc, quite apart from administrative and marketing costs.

Now in its sixth season, the KASB Premier League Football has established itself as one of the premier sports event in the city/country and this season, for the first time, KASB is also paying every single player in each of the 16 participating Clubs for playing for their respective teams. In addition, win bonuses and participation bonuses have been greatly enhanced, managers and coaches salaries have been introduced and quite apart from  the various cash awards and prizes, the winners will take an unprecedented cash award of Rupees one million (even higher than what the National League winners take). As in past seasons, this is quite apart from all other costs being borne by KASB. In addition, in cooperation with Sports360, this season, a huge talent hunt was also initiated which was attended by over 1,000 participants.

As against in other countries where the Federations/Associations bear some part of the costs and teams/clubs pay their own players, KASB has been picking up all these costs and more for the last six years.

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