Bengaluru, Karnataka, India: Embassy Office Parks REIT (NSE: EMBASSY / BSE: 542602) (‘Embassy REIT’), India’s first listed REIT and the largest in Asia by area, has received the Global benchmark certification from the British Safety Council for health and safety practices implemented in controlling the spread of COVID-19 across its pan India operating office portfolio of 26.2 million square feet (msf), making it one of the largest portfolios by size to qualify for the British Safety Council’s COVID-19 Assurance Assessment. The British Safety Council’s COVID-19 Assurance Assessment provides a framework for organizations to develop and implement robust and relevant protocols and arrangements designed to effectively manage the risk of transmission of COVID-19 as far as is reasonably practicable within their workplace.
Mike Robinson, CEO of the British Safety Council commented, “As lockdowns have eased and more and more people have started returning to work, it is right that workers and employers want to have confidence that every possible step has been taken to keep workplaces safe. With the COVID-19 Assurance Assessment, Embassy Office Parks (REIT) has shown that their protocols and associated control arrangements were in accordance with current government and sector specific guidelines and arrangements for continual monitoring of their effectiveness were in place.”
As India gets back to business, Embassy REIT has implemented several initiatives to welcome occupiers and employees to #OfficeAgain. All of Embassy REIT’s properties continue to remain operational with over 95% of occupiers and over 18,000 people on an average working from the premises since September 1st to date. Starting weeks prior to the lockdown and through these months, Embassy REIT has successfully executed multiple health and safety initiatives across parks including thermal cameras, deep cleaning, sanitization and fumigation activities across the common areas and in high footfall zones, advanced air filtration and cleansing systems, touchless visitor management and other social distancing norms.
Michael Holland, CEO of Embassy REIT commented, “Given the physical, digital and social infrastructure challenges around work from home, we believe that our office parks will continue to be the venue for building company culture, collaboration, training and teamwork. Our teams have ensured that all our properties are ‘COVID-19 Secure’ and our recent British Safety Council certification demonstrates that we are fully equipped to handle best-in-class health & safety protocols as occupiers return to #OfficeAgain. We continue to see the positive ramp-up in employees returning to the workplaces across our 75 buildings in India.”
Embassy REIT’s #OfficeAgain campaign video showcasing its readiness to support occupiers as they prepare to re-populate offices generated significant engagement across social media. The video can be accessed at: http://bit.ly/EmbassyREIT-OfficeAgain.
