The Specialist Forum Volume 13 No 11 November 2013 | Page 11
MARKET FORUM
Eli Lilly employees give
back to community
Thousands of Eli Lilly employees celebrated the Global Day of Service
on 10 October by taking part in various community projects around the
globe. In SA, Lilly employees spent the day in Zandspruit, an informal
settlement in Johannesburg planting sack gardens, vaccinating and
washing dogs as well as educating the community on how to care for
their animals. The team also hosted a party for children in the area.
The project is part of Lilly’s Hands and Hearts global initiative. As part
of the initiative, Lilly employees around the world donate their time and
energy to improve the health and wellbeing of their local communities.
“At Lilly, we’re committed to supporting the communities where we
work and live. We encourage and support employee volunteerism
to help strengthen our communities. This year, we have focused on
projects that not only uplift the community, but encourage community
members to get involved in making a difference in their daily lifes,” said
Ann-Marie Hosang-Archer, managing director of Lilly SA.
In addition to creating gardens in a sack, which makes these gardens
portable and small, Lilly’s volunteers showed community residents how
to plant and maintain their own sack gardens.
“Our volunteerism isn’t about donating our time for just one day –
many of these projects have a longevity that develops as a result of
our employees’ experiences with the community,” noted HosangArcher.? SF
Million rand upgrade of
pharmaceutical manufacturing plant
WrapSA, the country’s largest bona fide pharmaceutical contract-
manufacturer, recently announced the R80million refurbishment of their
manufacturing plant in Centurion, Gauteng. The refurbishment, initiated
in 2007, is due for completion in July 2014.
In 2007, SA became the second developing country to join
the Pharmaceutical Inspection Convention, and the Pharmaceutical
Inspection Co-operation Scheme - jointly referred to as PIC/S, explained Nardus Alberts, founder and CEO of WrapSA.
The idea behind PIC/S, which currently has 43 member countries
internationally, is that all participating countries operate within the same
international-level of standards. These standards include training and
inspection formats, among many other stringent guidelines, which are
vital for compliance to the international field of Good Manufacturing
Practice. This meant that the entire infrastructure of the country’s pharmaceutical manufacturing industry had to be examined.
“Being the largest of a handful of companies that will be able to meet
PIC/S’ stringent standards, we will achieve a superior positioning as the
South African supplier of choice to many major international pharmaceutical brands and organisations. For consumers, this will provide the
The Specialist Forum | November 2013
priceless benefit of being able to rely on the safety of your pharmaceutical and toiletry products,” noted Alberts.
The primary areas of refurbishment are air handling and the running
and maintenance of the new facilities and operational systems.? SF
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