UGANDA – Uganda Breweries Limited, subsidiary of Diageo through East African Breweries Limited (EABL) has bagged two awards at the Diageo Global Supply Chain and Procurement Awards.

The company scooped the Brewery of the Year Award and the Excellence in Health, Safety and Wellbeing Award for Financial Year 2020/2021.

The awards are intended to bring together performance and values of Diageo globally, recognize and celebrate the individuals and teams that have delivered outstanding performance throughout the year.

Mr. Alfred Balikagira, the Supply Chain Director at UBL has embraced the wins by the alcoholic drink maker and termed it as a demonstration of the capability that has been built within their operations over the years and the great potential that they have within their teams.

“The drive for continuous improvement that is embedded in everything we do has made it possible to achieve these awards. These awards are a further demonstration of ownership by our shop floor team to be able to translate the manufacturing best practices into their day today execution routines with every one walking the talk.

“It’s this culture of ownership that will ensure we sustain and continue to excel as a business and remain as the market leaders within the industry,” Mr. Balikagira said.

Shining some light on the Excellence in Health, Safety and Wellbeing award, it is a testament to the brewery being one of the safest work places in the world since time immemorial.

In 2020, UBL and the spirits plant International Distillers Uganda (IDU), celebrated 8 & 12 years of No Lost Time Accidents (LTA) respectively.

An LTA (Lost Time Accident) is a type of accident that causes an employee to skip work for a day or more since they’d be ordinarily pursuing treatment to get better.

These kinds of accidents are common place in plants where heavy machinery is operated such as a brewery.

Uniquely however, the company had no single employee skipping work even for a single day because of such work-related accidents.

Ron MITI, the health and safety manager at UBL, celebrated the milestone as an indication of growing personal safety and engagement through leadership at all levels of the business.

“This is even more impressive considering the employees took it upon themselves and kept their safety focus while operating and working around heavy equipment, flammable and hazardous materials at the brewery,” he said.

“We celebrate and dedicate the award to our individual employees at the plants who have ensured that they follow all guidelines and measures to ensure safety at the workplace and kept themselves safe for smoother working operations. A toast to you all,” the company added.

The awards come a month after the company celebrated a significant milestone of having existed for 75 years.

To commemorate the palladium jubilee, the beer maker undertook a sequence of anniversary celebrations that ran for 7 months leading up to its anniversary on 27th July 2021.

Registered in 1946, Uganda Breweries Limited has become one of the greatest truly Ugandan iconic brands dedicated to celebrating and transforming lives in Uganda, East Africa and internationally.

Its product portfolio has grown over the years from its flagship product Bell Lager in 1950, to becoming the biggest alcoholic beverages company with the richest brand portfolio consisting of 10 beer brands, 42 spirit brands, 3 ready to drink brands and 1 non- alcoholic beverage.

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