FrieslandCampina WAMCO, the leading dairy maker in Nigeria known for its iconic brands such as Peak milk, Three Crowns milk, among others, has been named the company with the best CSR programmes in West Africa (2015) by Capital Finance International (CFI.co), a London-based global print journal and online resource reporting on business, economics and finance.

The award was announced in the latest edition of the journal.

FrieslandCampina WAMCO, is a unit of Royal FrieslandCampina of The Netherlands, the world’s largest dairy cooperative, which pioneered corporate citizenship projects in Nigeria in 2004 – long before it became fashionable. “Since then, FrieslandCampina WAMCO has maintained three corporate citizenship programmes; a water project, school adoptions, and a tertiary endowment fund aimed at offering financial support to research in food science in six universities. The endowment also includes a Best Graduating Student Award,” CFI.co reported.

Since its inception, the company’s water project has built over 40 solar-powered boreholes, while its school adoption programme has equipped 18 public secondary schools with education support materials.

In addition to these three main projects, FrieslandCampina WAMCO actively supports about 30 charitable organisations across the country with both grants and products. The company has also partnered international aid organisations to offer nutrition relief to thousands of internally displaced people who fled from terrorist attacks in parts of northern Nigeria and now live in refugee camps.

In 2010, FrieslandCampina WAMCO launched its Dairy Development Programme (DDP) in a bid to support the Nigerian government’s initiative to further develop agriculture. The programme has gradually expanded its geographic footprint and includes provisions for the transfer of milk production technology to Nigerian farmers.

According to the CFI.co report, the award judges considered among other things that in Nigeria, large multinational corporations are asked to assume an increasingly larger share of responsibility for the well-being of the natural and social environment they operate in, “and FrieslandCampina WAMCO’s trail-blazing approach has not only inspired others to follow suit, but also placed the diary producer at the very top of the corporate food chain.”

FrieslandCampina WAMCO led Nigeria´s dairy industry with 13 awards in 2015.