Corporate Social Responsibility in the Arab Word

The general description of the Corporate Social Responsibility has the basic implementation of several issues for sustainable development in the business world as well as an efficient managerial role. Key areas of the CSR might be diverse as well as has arisen of confusion due to the transformation of geographic features, cross-culture orientation, time, and generation gap. The most acceptable CSR framework has dealt with a promise to handle business economic development, concern on environmental issues and influence of the social dynamics in both domestic and multi-domestic businesses, and so on.

Alternatively, the CSR would be applied on engaging the multi-stakeholder partnership form and here the traditional perception has been expressed through a triple bottom line where both society and environment have connected by the bottom line view (World Bank 67).

GREG Simpson CSR conference Doha

During last of January 2009, the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and Industry arranged the CSR conference in Doha, Qatar with sponsorship of the Qatar Ministry of Business and Trade. On behalf of the Center for International Private Enterprise, CSR conference Doha has tried to demonstrate how the global private markets would become strengthen in terms of ventures. It has to be quoted that the CIPE has consulted over the thousand domestic enterprises in more than 100 countries around the world in the area of strategic guidelines, invention of modern associations, improvement of government policies, from viewpoint of egalitarianism in new market identification and establishment. Beside these strategic supports, the CIPE has also made available of financial advantages, realistic skills or efficiency as well as administrative aids. Consequence of this, interested countries would have enough competent to revising both of the democratic outline as well as the economic organism. Furthermore, the CIPE has enough concern on the participation of the enterprises through the democratic source of action, being a superior corporate citizen, establishing equal rights by involvement of local government such as municipalities or in concise form of a prefect reflection of the CSR. In this part of the paper, the CSR has significantly focused on the geographic region MENA on behalf of the conference Doha.

Compared to the charity by means of philanthropy the CSR has a more effective role in assembling social awareness along with the broader form of the corporate citizen. Businesses are now can be defined as an institution that has ensured civic rights as well as interests treatment or in an alternative way value exchanging reasonably. While the transaction of business occurs, the CSR has numerous modes to assemble as well as to articulate. As a consequence of all the aforesaid, the CSR has provided aid to outline both external and internal frames of the organization where well manner or norm has motivated by rewarding and on the other hand, faults or careless acts have diminished through punishment or penalties. Under this course of action, the operating vacuum of the organisation has filled so that it could run toward the superior development atmosphere upon which it can rely as well as defend the potential difficulties (Simpson 3)

It has already been quoted that, the CSR concerns have protected human rights in order to manufacture an excellent municipal region where global health forces have also be treated significantly, for instance, hygiene and safe product and services, aware of HIV or AIDS, stop child labor, establishment of the human resource management compliances etc. A principal point has to remember that superior corporate citizen has pursued short-term profit generation rather than be a yield pioneer. Followed by this point, multiple stakeholders have been required to advance ethical standard establishment as well as to promote a better business atmosphere in terms of better investment strategy for a flexible investment carried on (Davis 3).

Though the CSR has to maintain spherical flow among the consumers, personnel as well as the civil society so that it has to concentrate more on norms , managerial decision making hierarchy and struggle for the superiority rather than irregular charitable activities along with financial performance evaluation. All of these left an ultimate score in order too differentiate business sensation and the breakdown. During the conference Doha, the CSR affiliated with the corporate citizen has defined though societal deed due to a fair concentration on the human rights, demonstrate organisational endurance in order to conduct business functions on the right track and economically flourished the civic. Left behind of the aforementioned following are a few prime concern of practicing superior corporate citizen. (Simpson 2)

Establishing brand image as well as reputation

At the end of the 2003, the world economic forum argued that corporate success has derived from the nutritious organisational reputation in most of the cases moreover it has expressed that among 1500 executive employees 60% emphasise on the firm’s goodwill and the rest of the 40% concentrated on market expansion. Alternatively, goodwill of an organisation has directly or passively influence on the sustainability, profit margin, long time satisfactory performance etc. It has to be pointed that this survey was conducted on the performance evaluation of over thousand companies in between 1980 and 1990 (World Bank 15).

Capital accessibility enlargement

During the credit markets, significance of the company goodwill tends towards a leading position as well as long term flexible operation within the market. In order to reduce cost of production socially liable organisations required a large amount of capital or investment. The renowned financial experts and Investors have been emphasising continuously on the social issues of corporate bodies and eager to invest in responsible companies who care for the CRS. Meanwhile, the responsible businesses have demonstrated a major role to promoting corporate governance system, for the issues such as, demonstrating transparency, practice of independent audit, as well as supervising board limitations that assists to ensure the investment more risk-free. Economists of the Middle East countries have also pointed out the linkage among socially liable companies and their interest rates on loan amount in short term where goodwill has a wider value for lenders. (Simpson 3)

Superior quality and efficient employees

The socially liable organisations would practice to produce and retain superior quality employees so that they could successfully boost the capabilities of the company with a well-built corporate citizen scheme hence develop employee’s morale and facilitate a superior transparency as well as openness within the business process. It would initiate the dynamic of labour relationship as well as union bargaining with the antagonistic issues in order to practice expanded cooperative relationship.

Reduced business risk and cost benefit

Taking part into corporate citizenship scheme as well as environmental dynamics would deliver fines that are more constructive and rulings to the organisations those have passed through dilemmas with the legal boundaries and the organisation that exposure more fineness in its legal proceedings could widely reduce its business risk and cost benefits. It may demonstrate that it is keeping its attention to avoid the dilemmas for which it has been felt guilty when the public has preferred breakdown, which would be proved the company’s irresponsibleness as well as aim to attempt not wrapping their malfunction but takes necessary initiatives in order to prevent further accident. The socially responsible business concerns would also practice to prevent numerous catastrophes rest from its operation (GERN 102).

Enhanced financial activities

From viewpoint of the financial activities, the corporate citizenship would be shaped its outline and there have numerous scopes of study, which would be present, a trade-off between liable business applications as well as better financial activities. On the other hand, a business holder’ standpoint, it would be easy to comprehend the economic collisions that would be brought the greater yield and here it has presented briefly. It has been evaluated through the study of the data analysis as well as survey on renowned corporate executives that the company that has aimed to overlook a superior corporate citizenship scheme their financial performance has better than any other has (Simpson 1).

Alternatively, the way of attracting foreign direct investment by the emergent nations and budding markets, have created encouragements for the private enterprises, which have emphasised mostly on socially accountable business performances; and in order to site on a leading market position the amplification of democracy practice in addition to free market establishment is important. Ahead of three decades, financial investment flows in the emergent nations have governed by the foreign aid but at present, the private enterprises have far away from the leading dealers of the foreign financial investments. Numerous factors have made the yields excessively precarious as for example; harassment in practicing property rights, practice of corruption in the political organism, absent of integrity during contract enforcement could be discouraged the businesses while entering into new markets, isolation of the economic as well as legal uncertainties and so on. From viewpoint of the conventional understanding, low labour wages have not sufficient to encourage the businesses overlooking this type of limitations. furthermore, in the International Labour Organization have studied that the FDI during more than 127 nations have recommended that the major portion of the financial investment has went to the countries that have superior municipal autonomy though their require high labour wages.

The MENA regions have acknowledged that involvement of the CSR policy and its implementations would be province oriented and the MENA perception for the CSR has continuous charity tilting in most of the cases, though still now those are the peripheral issues of a business. Business operation in the MENA section would needed to institutionalise the entire practices as well as has reallocated their appreciative towards the CSR scheme to a broader form of the superior corporate citizenship and this requirement is composed by advance level of business ethics as well as decent leadership approach that is a part of traditional and philanthropic CSR. On the other hand, the corporate governance is a significant issue has the schemes and performances where the business has to develop transparency as well as accountability through edge of the individual competency, personnel, administration, or the proprietors to be employed while corruption would carry out. Under the free market democracy, CSR, have to focus on developments and strengthen the private enterprises to a corruption free corporate governance including the dynamics of superior corporate citizenship where the CIPE would most dynamically affianced.

Corporate Social Responsibility and corporate citizenship in the Arab World

CSR scenario in the Arab World

It has been proved that numerous nations as well as the private enterprises of the Arab world have accomplished supplementary development rather than the other. However, the CSR continuously leftover more on philanthropy though it has primarily considered external business issues which has antagonism to the internal processes while mainstreaming into the fundamental operations, strategies, long-term planning etc. Typically, the CSR has been demonstrated by the multinational companies furthermore it has passed during the subsidiaries of the region although there have performed a few domestic as well as regional CSR oriented conferences and consultancies. These programmes have rebounded still there have hanged about the requirement of consciousness that have focused on convenient guidelines in addition to harmonise the CSR definition, precedence as well as schemes (Simpson 23).

It has to quoted that the CSR has assembled through environment, cross culture, geographic atmosphere, and specific sectors that either constitutes it in a particular country or in unusual industry sectors not be resonating to apply it in different once for illustration, customer, ecological dynamics, personnel, government legal affair across the societal activities and so on. Within the MENA region, the World Bank report has surveyed and identified that the CSR has diverse implication in different region in the MENA moreover the report has exposed that the CSR is now superlative understand as well as evident as an external generosity of a private company. In this way, the CSR has driven primarily either by the balanced business preference or by the political option rather than has taken place of starting and responding of the pressures as well as demands of the society. Most of the Arabian countries could not differentiate the difference between the ethical behaviour and the regular practice of general laws while they have liked to outlined and evaluate their business behaviour. Following are the key drivers of the CSR in the MENA region (World Bank 25).

One of the key regions have resonated strappingly both the Arab private companies as well as government organizations those have demonstrated the CSR in order to manufacture the sense of an optimistic multiplication effect on the their escalation considering the private companies affiliation in the midst of the juvenile. Make available persuade employment opportunities for young generation all over the Arab world has faced the most significant as well as sustainable improvement constraints and the emergent young unemployed generation has also in a major crisis since there have frequently exists dissimilarity among expertise requirements and in the job description. On the other side, “small and medium sized enterprise” and “family owned enterprises” has played incredibly prominent role in the development and success of the Arab region and the other contributions are critically transmitted to the Arabian region’s trade and industry competitiveness, creating and enlarging wealth. Investment on the young generation would be paying off a larger skill as well as entrepreneurial labour force contribution (GERN 23).

Considering issues for further progress

The during November 2007, the Arab World conference in Cairo have paid attention on the CSR as well as the superior corporate citizenship all over Arab World. Over the same time, without any doubt the MENA OECD Investment Forum and the Responsible Business Forum has presented an additional policy making dialogue of the CSR. Following are the prime issues that have justified the attention of the CSR dialogues (Retzky 45).

• to overcome the existing development challenges along with long term sustainable curriculum, the Arab world has to left behind the truly charitable behaviours
• A lucid definition of the CSR and its contributions in the MENA region have to be observed by the domestic and local stakeholders
• For the CSR in the MENA region make adequacy of the business cases
• Besides the expanded social responsibility and business ethics of the private companies could be manufacture a superior corporate citizenship scheme where the concept would captured both of the business compliances along with the corporate management strategies as well as civic privileges
• Expansion of the potential modes by which the socially responsible schemes of the root level of the businesses could be incorporated towards the harmonised exertion for the multinational enterprises along with their supply chain management system
• Advertisement of the business associations have played a promotional function whenever they was promoting their business engagement for the development, capturing market position, communication accomplishments and to solve the aggregate activities those have faced dilemmas
• Identification of the corruption practice areas as well as the remote economic sectors
• Encourage the women entrepreneurs for their valuable initiatives in both of the political and economic grounds
• Identification as well as promoting the entrepreneurs role in different business modes like SME, FOE etc. for the elastic development
• spawn consciousness in all over a country’s organizational hierarchy such as domestic and local business enterprises, in the entire society
• make a balance among national, civic and local regulation furthermore make confirmation of the enforcement consistency
• Nurturing innovation
• Hearten and promote partnership between the public and private companies
• In order to encourage cross cultural consciousness as well as ethical behaviour in the young generation it would be profitable to promote partnership among educational institutions
• paying attention on realistic regulation guidelines and recommendations that would ensure the understanding of the company’s mission, vision, objectives and long term sustainable goal implementation

Responsible competitiveness May 2009 Jordan and Country reports UAE

Over the last few decades, the Arab world has made enormous improvement in responsible competitiveness. During May 2009, the World Economic Forum on the Middle East reported on overview of the responsible competitiveness focusing Jordan and UAE. The concept of the responsible competitiveness explained about the rewarding of the private enterprises that has concentrated on socio-environmental as well as economic dilemmas. All of these have exercised how a nation would prosper when they have assembled business ethics with the competitiveness issues and in this way, it would be possible to make sustainable development throughout the global market (Retzky 13).

The accountability factors accumulated with highly dependable competitiveness of the report from perspective of the globalisation including non-profit welfare thinkers aimed to the sustainability brilliance of Arabia world where the strategic recommendation prolong with the support of the ASLG. By utilisation of the modern customised benchmarking, the responsible competitiveness in the Arab World has made available a complete evaluation of the regional performance for the 15 Arabian countries. Judgment of the Arabian region has offered most important strengths even though now it is facing the recession or the global economic downturn but major obstacles have responsible for the continuation of competitiveness. At present, within 116 countries the Arab world has held the average position of 66. On the other side, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries have held in the position of 23 whether the Arab world has in front of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia¹³ where the aggregate average status is of 71 (World Bank 11).

Furthermore, the report has also provided a remarkable benchmarking for the whole Arab world and it has proved the systematic assessment to blame competitiveness in the Arabian region that has encouraged to arrange their individual schedule in order to turn into a global competitive superpower and management scheme of their fertility challenges. In addition to build on their own responsible competitive advantages and demonstrated the liable business performance that would be enough strongly and optimistically associated by means of liable competitiveness, civic or municipal development furthermore innovative (Retzky 1–3).

The Arab world could turn the era of global economic downturn into an era of opportunities. The commitments of this region are fastening the transparent business practices as well as elegant managerial strategies to point out the existing financial dilemmas whenever the fundamental principles move toward elastic progresses. The liable competitiveness has to exercise and integrate in the all of the business development segments. For the transformation the Arab could be follow the following four guidelines (GERN 19).

• Concentrating on the young generation and enhancing talent development, appreciating efficient and effective current initiatives, would be helpful in overcoming the challenges.
• Take superior initiatives to decrease the environmental pollutions by means of energy efficiency culture as well as advertisement of renewable energy in the workplace or official atmosphere for the management sustainability and smart urban planning.
• Beside the environment, promoting the conscientious business weather with consistence to the governance in addition to back up the parameter sustainability during trade and investment of managerial strategies along with incentives
• In order to be a global innovator by means of investment in the key business zones as for example, practice of Islamic finance, water management modules and green infrastructure within a large-scale.

All over the Arab world, in terms of wealthy financial system similar to Gulf countries, middle level earning countries such as Tunisia, Jordan, and developing nations as Yemen, Mauritania, etc. have liable for the initiatives of competitiveness in order to exchange. More specifically, the Saudi Arabia has formed their own ambitious “10×10” competitiveness strategies that has included its own accountability while applying competitive initiative. Conversely, Egypt has executed the Arab-language code for the first time for the corporate governance and Jordan has composed their conscientious competitiveness over the financial management, hotel, and tourism sector as well as in the construction or real estate departments. The Arab Sustainability Leadership Group has a provincial association with the business leaders, administration, NGOs municipal society etc. This group has aimed to pass through the regional inventiveness for the sustainable performance over the leadership program along with advocacy principles to construct a link among the Arabian regions with the rest of the world. At present, it bounds five countries by 13 organisations and the cluster has aimed to enlarge this association including all the Arabian countries (Retzky 39).

Global Trends in Corporate Citizenship

The tradition view of corporate citizenship have changed over time where previously it entails only to the responsibilities like providing employment opportunity, paying taxes, earning revenues and finally helps the society in disasters. Now corporate citizenship is the heart of the organization and it directly relates to the other functions of managements. Big multinational organizations are the driving forces behind the change of the concept and it largely depends on the geographical position as the culture and concerns of people are vary from one region to other.

At the beginning of the 19^th century, laissez-faire is the business system in USA where the system was broken due to the suspicion among the social members and the government imposes some rules and regulation over the business. However, at the end of the century the government again relaxes the regulation to the business and as a result, the social obligation of business had broken down. In Europe, after the Second World War, the corporate citizenship refers to the creation of the job, increasing the living standard of people and some concern about the health and environment. Compare to other countries in Europe, UK is the most advanced performer of corporate citizenship movement, and the government directly involved with this movement and supported the business organization to perform their social responsibility. As a result, the UK considered as the golden standard performer of Corporate Citizenship. Kinnicutt and Philip argued that the corporate citizenship movement in Germany is a little bit slower than the UK where the business organization was happy with paying the taxes, creating jobs, follow the rules and shows little concerns about the society and environment (50). In contrast to the developed nations, in developing country, the pressures for economic growth and social responsibilities both are high and some government tries to balance between these twos. The most important matter is that different nations show the corporate citizenship from different angle such as in China the government directly interferes on the issues but in UAE, this obligation fully lies on the corporate houses. Beside these instances, the corporate citizenship movement advancing fundamentally over the last few decades and some organization think it from the viewpoint of corporate governance, sustainability etc with other issues.

Corporate citizenship in UAE

United Arab Emirates comprises of seven sovereign states with Islam law and heredity ruling in the root of the country where the corporate citizenship is in a primary stage. Practices of corporate social responsibility limited to the donation and charity in the form of Zakat, which is the basic rules of Islam and all organization, must contribute to the Zakat fund especially in the month of Holly Ramadan. Local organization did not understand the concept of CSR or corporate citizenship. But the notion of Corporate Citizenship in those areas rise due to the establishment of some organizations and concerns of business and political persons such as Centre for Responsible Business (CRB) of Dubai Chamber, the Centre for Corporate Value, the initiative to establish zero carbon city and finally extensive coverage of media (GERN, 65). The less concern about the corporate citizenship among the corporation is due to some reasons in which the attitudes of the owner or management of the organization are first where the manager think it is fashion which will gone after some times. There are also some other reasons which includes the following factors:

• The dominance of some company in the business creates less pressure to act responsibly to the stakeholders.
• Lack of understanding of corporate citizenship among the stakeholders does not crate pressures to the organization.
• The structure of the business and society does not crates that much scope for CSR practices among the organization and lack of communication is another reason for not advancement on this issues.

Beside of the above-mentioned factors, the high growth rate of the businesses and the economy in Dubai is responsible for the establishment of the industries in cities that possess a high growth rate of population. As a result, the numbers of youths are increasing, and the demand for the experienced people in industry is increasing as well creating a social imbalance all throughout. Therefore, some challenges are emerging to adopt the CSR concept in the country. The major challenges of UAE are integrating the concept of corporate citizenship with the rapid growth of the industry. Without adopting the CSR in business, the health, safety and other environmental issues will seriously be damaged due to this growth.

Aramex at a glance

Aramex is one of the unparallel companies in the Arab world possessing the strongest supply chain, which now operates globally by affiliation with Global Distribution alliance and other associations; it started its journey in 1982 through two offices located in Jordan and New York. Aramex expanded its business through three areas, comprising freight forwarding, express and other functions; these areas are the main sources of revenues of the company. Currently the company operates in 195 cities around the world with more than 7000 employees who serve more than 50000 corporate clients along with the regular customers. Beside the global market, Aramex has tremendous acceptability in Middle East, which is covered by the core competences of the company. The business has currently enlisted in Dubai stock exchange and its stock price is AHD 2.55, and it has targeted to raise the price on AHD 3.08 in the same market; this will be possible through its current growth rate and revenue earnings (Murad & Rasha 25).

Corporate Social Responsibility of Aramex:

Corporate Social Responsibility is the commitment of an organization to behave ethically and responsibly, and to contribute positively to the society and develop the standards of job environment within the organization and to work for the maximum benefit of its members and consequently for the society (Baker, 1). Aramax positively responds to the society and treats the community unlike a part of its customers. Starting from its inception, until today, Aramex always tried to act fairly and contribute not only to the society but to the humanity as well. According to Fadi Ghandour, the CEO of Aramex, the CSR is regarded as the sustainability means of maximising utilisation of the stakeholders through its growth in economic environment and social developments of the country (sustainability report 2006). Some of the initiatives taken by Aramex to satisfy their Corporate Social Responsibilities are as follows:

Contribution to the economy

Aramex’s main aim is to contribute to the economy through the enlargement of its shipping around the globe, which would directly affect the global trade and commerce. Through the organic affect and strategic initiatives, the company was able to increase its shipment 45% in the year 2005, and 38% in the year 2006. The economic boom of the Arab world during the last decade happened due to the growth of the local companies, and Aramex was also a part of it; this created a strong link of Aramex with the outer world resulting in a growth and a strong opportunity for local employment and high living standard. The profit scenario of the company is the evidence of this growth (the revenues earned in 2006 was $371 billion from which it retained $25 billion to directly contribute to the economy). Aramex enters into a new region at every year and creates employment opportunities for that region, which positively affect the economy of that province.

Creation of social value

Customer Value: As part of its social values, Aramex places supreme priority to its customers and feel the customer service as their core ideals. The operation of the company is team based and the teams are specialized in serving the customers of different levels and requirements. Its success rate in delivering the parcel on time in 2006 was 94%. Aramex maintain strict privacy of its customer’s documents and its working team is aware of taking feedback from customers to increase the quality of services. In marketing, the company always provides true statement and information about the products and services and the advertisement messages is straightforward and creative.

Human Resource Value: Aramex considers that its people are the main resource of the business and the success of the company is made possible through their contribution. Aramex is an equal opportunity provider where the remuneration of the employees are not settled on the basis ethnicity, colour, religion, or gender – rather on the performance; it paves the way for working women beside men in the organization. Aramex has created a workplace of international standard where employees can work safely with satisfaction. For safety of the employees, the company established a safety-working group who continuously works on the safety issues of the workforce. In the issues of security, the company has imposed a clear regulation for the employees that work with TAPA (Transported Asset Protection Association) for the security of the goods of customers.

Contribution to the urban area

Aramex is very much concerned about the area where they runs their business; this requires giving considerations to the reduction of traffic congestion in the road, noise diminution, safety driving and controlled discharge of fume. Regarding the issues of noise reduction, the company has moved their location from one place to another and have withdrawn their operation from that area. In case of safety driving, the company received some grievances about the risky driving in the residential area where the vehicles do not maintain rules of the residential roads, Aramex strictly warned the drivers of the vehicles and planed to move the office from the residential site. Concerning highway driving, the company required the drivers to be bound by the rules of driving and to use its contact number for any complaints. To reduce the traffic congestion Aramex takes three fold strategies, which includes avoiding the rush hours, utilize alternative route by technological support, and finally, use of alternative vehicles for avoiding congestion. The company plans to apply vehicles that exhaust very low or zero amount of carbon and other substances that will not harm the environment.

Contribution to the Community

Aramex has a good reputation to contribute to the community in the form of charitable donations and promotions of the culture and sports. It initiated the emergence of “Ruwwad”, a non-profit organization to develop the standard of living of Arab community. The company also develops a model for the investment in the society, which helps the business to set the priority of investment and asses the impact of investment in the society. Aramex addresses four major areas about society for community development, which are reducing the gap between developed and developing societies, empowering the young generation, empowering the community and finally, providing relief in emergencies and disasters.

Firstly, Aramex concentrates on the community of developing economies where not all needs of the people are met and they face financial problems. The company already invested $220,362 from its profit for communal development through its various programs, which directly affect the welfare of the society.

Secondly, most of the employees of Aramex are from the young generation and the company keeps special concentration on them, initiates different programs to energize young people, and tries to make more employment opportunities for them. Primarily the company support games through sponsorships; in Amman, it enhanced its support to develop infrastructure of sports by creating new field and developing existing one for the games. Beside this, Aramex also contribute to the educational institutes to reduce the disparities between the various institutional framework and educational quality. The company tries to reduce the economic pressures from the young people through generating employment opportunities for them.

Thirdly, Aramex take the initiative to empower the community through the establishment of Arab Foundation for Sustainable Development “Ruwwad” with local community organizations Jabal Al Natheef to increase the living standard of Arab nation (Aramex Sustainability Report). It also founded Mousab Khorma Youth Empowerment Fund for supporting the poor students of Arab for their education.

Finally, Aramex realizes the nature of hardships by the environmental or other disasters and tries to help the victims in during the emergencies. Primarily, as a supply chain company, it accumulates the aids from various corners of the society to the disastrous areas as quick as possible. The company raised funds for Lebanon and made a campaign named ‘Aid Lebanon with Us’ in which they got tremendous support from the donors and successfully assisted the victims of the country. In Palestine, Aramex relinquished the aid for various refugee camps and it made a special program to attain the medical equipments to various areas of the territory. The company played a great role in the Pakistan’s earthquake and in Tsunami through various campaigns for supporting the people in those devastating provinces. In 2008, Aramex started another initiative named “Deliver Hope to Gaza” to support the people of Palestine, which is one of the major contributions of the company to the country that was sternly affected by the aggression of Israel (Bardelli, & Manuela 14).

CSR in Islam

Corporate social responsibility of Islam lies on the rules and regulation given to Muslims through the Holy Book Quran and through the lifestyle of Prophet Mohammed PBUH, and the Hadith, which are the code of life for every Muslim. In Islam, the CSR must be measured from two perspectives, which are the financial perspective, and social perspective; most of the business only concentrates on the financial perspective but not on the social perspective; however, Aramex is very must concerned about its social responsibilities. Like the general sustainability of CSR, Islam also creates the prospects for sustainability in business following the Islamic rules. There are four fundamental codes, which must be followed by every Muslim including the business personalities, such as, the Unity, Equilibrium, Free Will, and Responsibilities (Mohammed 32).

• Unity: Unity means the businessperson is always truthful and trustworthy and never makes effort to gain wealth through any deprivation and discrimination to other. He never follows any unethical actions in the business operations only because the businessperson has the fear and love to Allah. He must not discriminate with his employees and other stakeholders in any form; and from the employees’ side, they are also ethically responsible in performing their duties properly by not acting in any ways to harm the business. Islam does not allow monopolies in any sense, and requires that the seller should inform properly to the buyer about the product, and the buyer should buy the product with the proper price. Any sort of fraudulent activities are strongly prohibited in Islam.
• Equilibrium: In business, equilibrium means that the competition in the market must be fair and the market would be open for all with no internal conspiracies. The businessperson must give the actual amount of goods to the buyer while selling the weight must be accurate. The employer must pay sufficiently to the employee and must pay before removing the sweat.
• Other Issues related to CSR: Transparency against corruption: Islam is against the corruption and it opposes the symbol of unethical conduct. In Quran, it has been stated that the Prophet PBUH curse the person who receives the bribe, who give it, and who make the condition. In case of transparency, Islam does not allow the caveat emptor and the seller should notify everything regarding the goods including the defects if present.
• Environmental Impact: Islam has the regulation regarding the safety of the environment as Allah crates everything no one have the right to destroy any creation without valid reason. Prophet PBUH declared two regions in Arab as safe zone where no one can enter for protecting natural resources and wildlife, which are hima and haram.
• Labour treatment: Islam stress on the fair labour policy and the worker must inform about his wage before joining in the work. The worker should paid immediately after completing the work and in the Day of Judgment Prophet PBUH will stand against the person who receive the full work from the labourer but did not give him the wages (Zinkin & Geoffrey 11).
• Free Will: In Islam, free will refers to the notion that the businesspersons can willingly perform a business contract and it is the duty of the other party to understand all the parts and negotiate on the price of the contract. Islam does not support the exchange of goods and the price of the good must comply with the reasonable and fair concept.
• Responsibility: Islam clearly stated that every Muslim is responsible for his or her own deeds and in case of any unfair dealing in business, the person, or persons related to the deal must be responsible. It is the responsibility of the businessperson to carry his business on a halal way and he must fulfil the obligation rest upon him.

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