ec awards winners 2014 part 1

7/25/2019 Ec Awards Winners 2014 Part 1

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Ethical Corporation | August 2014Report reviewReport review Ethical Corporation

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Ethical Corporation

Responsible BusinessAwards 2014 Part 1Celebrating responsible business excellence

www.ethicalcorp.com
http://www.ethicalcorp.com/http://www.ethicalcorp.com/


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Ethical Corporation | August 2014Report review Ethical CorporationBusiness awards 2014

Few in this field of sustainability enter it in search of medals and prizes. Thebest sustainability professionals are those who care passionately aboutusing the engines of business to make the world a better place.

But celebrating the best of what they do has its place. Its a way of recog-

nising stellar achievements and inspiring others to follow suit. That was the

driving motivation behind Ethical Corporations Fifth Annual Responsible

Business Awards, which saw nearly 200 of the industrys leading experts

convene in Londons Mayfair on 29 September.

Partnership

The term partnership now occupies a central position in the lexicon of sustain-

able business. All honest companies admit that they alone cannot solve the

big social and environmental issues of the day. Only through partnership do

they stand a chance.

The Net-Works social business initiative, which was singled out for the

Best Business/NGO Partnership, crystallises what a successful cross-sector

partnership approach looks like. The alliance promotes the recycling of

discarded fishing nets in low-income coastal communities in the Philippines.

The term

partnershipnow occupies

a centralposition in

the lexicon ofsustainable

business

Annual awards

Ethical Corporation ResponsibleBusiness Awards 2014By Oliver Balch

Our award winners epitomise the best of business practice

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Ethical Corporation | August 2014Report review Ethical Corporation

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biodegradablenets posea threat to

marine lifefor decades

Best Business/NGO Partnership: Net-Works(Interface and the Zoological Society of London)

The genius of Net-Works, this years winner of the Best Business/NGO

partnership, is that it gives local fishing communities in the Philippines

a sustainable alternative to two intractable problems: poverty and the

environment damage that comes with it.

Without recycling facilities, local fishermen typically discard their old

nets on the beach or in the sea. These non-biodegradable nets pose

a threat to marine life for decades. Carpet manufacturer Interface and

environmental non-profit group Zoological Society of London (ZSL) have

combined to design a solution based on a for-profit recycling initiative.Launched in January 2013, Net-Works pays villagers to collect old nets,

which are then sold directly to Interfaces nylon supplier. The nets are

reformulated and used for manufacturing Interfaces carpets.

The initiative has already led to the collection of more than 25 tonnes

of waste nets. Participating

villages, meanwhile, are

each able to put an extra

4,800 extra meals on the

table thanks to the income

they have received.

Nigel Stansfield, chief

innovations officer at Inter-

face, says the initiative

achieves all three basic

elements of sustainability:

economic, environmental

and social/ethical.

You cant do that in

isolation, he says. Youneed to develop strong,

collaborative relationships.

In our case, we did that through our supply chain and we did it with a

very strong partner.

Heather Koldewey, head of the global conservation programme at

ZSL, echoes Stansfields sentiments. Interface has enabled us to design

a sustainable business model and given us access to a global supply

chain. Thats really liberated some of these communities and allowed us

to set a new frame for conservation, she says.

ARTPHANEUF

Business awards 2014

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Mutualdependence

and mutualbenefit create

a successfulpartnership

The partnership meets the desire of

Interface, a closed-loop carpet manufac-turer and the projects corporate sponsor,

to identify recyclable nylon that can be

reused in its production processes back

in Europe. The Zoological Society of

London (ZSL), meanwhile, a conserva-

tion non-profit that forms the other half of

the partnership, has found a solution to

marine pollution caused by waste nets.

Were a big believer in collaborative inno-

vation. None of us are smarter than all ofus, says Nigel Stansfield, chief innova-

tions officer at Interface.

Net-Works is also testimony to the fact

that the best partnerships are often the

least expected. ZSL works to protect endangered animals and their habitats.

Interface makes carpets. Yet working together has helped both organisations

find new ways of doing things, says Heather Koldewey, head of the global

conservation programme at ZSL. Its not about philanthropy, she insists: Its

about combining skills and heads to come up with something that is truly inno-

vative and something that we couldnt do separately.

Similar fresh thinking characterises Banking on Change, a partnership

between Barclays and the development charities Care and Plan UK. The

judges highly commended the initiative for adopting a credit-led approach to

the problem of financial exclusion, which affects 2.5 billion people worldwide.

Banking on Change establishes savings and loans groups that save and lend

to one another. More than 25,000 such groups have been set up in 11 coun-

tries since the partnership kicked off in 2009.

An acknowledgement of mutual dependence and the promise of mutual

benefit are other factors behind a successful partnership. These qualities canbe seen in abundance in a collaboration between Diageos liqueur brand

Baileys and milk producer Glanbia Ingredients Ireland Limited (GIIL). Selected

for the Best B2B Partnership, the two companies have combined forces to

push sustainability through the entire Baileys supply chain from the first

gallon of fresh milk to the final product.

GIIL, which is the sole supplier of cream to Baileys, recently introduced

a sustainability and quality assurance programme. The initiative will see all

its 4,500 farmer suppliers audited to ensure they comply with environmental

benchmarks. The move forms part of the ongoing introduction of best practice

guidelines throughout the sector.


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Mobilinkprovides

teachers witha basic literacy

curriculum viatext messages

For Diageo, it is important that our business partners share our values with

respect to sustainability, responsible sourcing and ethical business practices,says Luis Rangel, global head of commodities and raw materials for the global

drinks company. Glanbia has been an outstanding example for everything

this award represents.

Selected as Highly Commended

in the B2B category, meanwhile, was

Mars Incorporated. The US confec-

tionary firm was picked out for the

200MW Mesquite Creek Wind Farm,

which will comprise 118 individual

wind turbines and will boast anannual output of 800,000 megawatt

hours. Mars is jointly underwriting

the colossal renewable project with

Sumitomo Corporation of Americas

and BNB Renewable Energy.

Relevance and results mark out

quality partnerships, too. And these

duly account for the final two awards

in this category. First, the award

for Most Effective International

Community Investment went to

mobile phone operator VimpelCom

for a long-running project by its Pakistani brand Mobilink aimed at promoting

female literacy in rural parts of the country. Run in association with childrens

charity Unicef, the initiative provides teachers with a basic literacy curriculum

via text messages. Early evidence shows that the literacy skills among young

female participants who number around 5,000 have more than doubled as

a consequence of their involvement.

As well as the impacts on literacy itself, its also allowing for a breakingdown of cultural barriers to women using mobile phones, says Chris Burgess,

head of corporate responsibility at VimpelCom. Theres a reinforcing busi-

ness rationale behind the companys involvement too, he adds. Illiteracy

levels among women in some parts of Pakistan are around 90%, so thats an

awful lot of people who cant use our services.

Support for vulnerable women also featured in a project in Assam, India,

run by tea brand Twinings. In this case, the company worked closely with local

and regional government agencies to provide more than 6,000 girls on 15 tea

estates with folic acid tablets (among other health interventions) to combat

rampant levels of anaemia.


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Ita Unibancoran aninnovative

financialeducation

programmefor its staff

Interestingly, gender and mobile connectivity

won the eye of the judges for the Most EffectiveDomestic Community Investment award too. The

cellphone operator Turkcell has used its mobile

technology to set up whats thought to be the

worlds first crowd-sourced microfinance project.

Money raised through the companys Women

Empowerment in Economy initiative has been

used to support 68,000 low-income women so far.

As with other prize-winning examples, the initia-

tive marks a collaborative effort between multiple

institutions in this case, Turkeys Ministry ofFamily and Social Policies and the Grameen Trust,

among others.

Another Turkish telecoms firm TTNET was highly commended. The

companys Internet4All programme aims to bridge the so-called digital divide

in Turkey by providing under-developed communities with internet literacy

training as well as low-cost internet access.

Engagement

If collaboration is essential to truly sustainable solutions, then engagement

is its critical precursor. Those involved in sustainability see the necessity of

responsible stewardship of the planets resources. But it cant be assumed

that everyone gets it.

For all companies, engaging their staff marks an imperative first step.

Without employees on board, a business is left with a well-meaning sustain-

ability strategies and zero action. US green household products firm Seventh

Generation has a worldwide reputation for being a values-based business. With

an intensive induction programme, regular discussions with the chief execu-

tive and ongoing training on sustainability issues, employees are clear about

the subjects importance. To avoid any doubt, 20% of employees bonuses aretied to the completion of four self-selected sustainability goals.

Yet pipping Seventh Generation (Highly Commended) to the post in this

years Best Employee Engagement category was Ita Unibanco. The Brazilian

bank won special commendation for an innovative financial education

programme that it runs for its staff. As a result, the number of employees that

now have savings accounts and pension plans has increased by 56% and

37%, respectively.

Not only are the personal finances of 80,000 staff members more stable.

Their advice to the banks customers shows improvements too. As Jorge

Paulo Rodrigues da Silva, a general commercial manager in one of the banks


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Clarity is

another keyattribute ofeffective

communication

branches, explains: Now, when we present the theme [of financial responsi-

bility] to our clients, they begin taking a significantly different view of our bank a view of a relationship that is more consistent, sensible, sustainable and,

above all, profitable.

Engaging key audiences outside, as well as inside,

the business is crucial as well. Interested parties, from

NGOs to investors, want to know how companies are

responding to sustainability risks and issues. One impor-

tant vehicle for achieving such communication is annual

reports. Beating off tough competition from the likes of

Merck, H&M (Highly Commended), Legal & General and

GE for Best Sustainability Report was Maersk.The Danish shipping group was praised for a very

clear, honest report. Not only did Maersk highlight its

achievements, but and this is all-important for external

credibility and engagement it was upfront about the

challenges it faces too. Among the difficult issues

tackled in the report are the challenges around facilitation

payments in the shipping industry, shipping accidents,

long working hours in China and poor supplier perfor-

mance on human rights.

Our story, societal context and wider purpose is told

consistently from year to year, and every year we are

able to add more data and facts to our societal impacts

through our impact studies, said Louise Kjaergaard,

group lead for sustainability communication at Maersk.

Along with consistency, clarity is another key attribute of effective commu-

nication. And it was this quality that drew the judges to Nestls Supplier

Code, which won the Swiss food giant the Best Supplier Engagement award.

The Code sets out non-negotiable minimum standards for the companys

suppliers, right down to the individual farm level. Its not about applying a bigstick, though. Nestl provides guidelines and advice to help its suppliers make

their business practices more sustainable. Already, 74% of its supply base is

fully compliant. As a result of its supplier engagement efforts, Nestl can now

trace 28% of the volumes of its 12 key commodities back to source.

High Commended, meanwhile, was Woolworths. As with Nestl, the South

African retailer asks its fresh produce and horticulture suppliers to meet core

environmental standards. As part of its Farming for the Future initiative, all of

these suppliers are independently audited. Whats rare about the programme

is that Woolworths foots the bill for these initial audits, not the supplier. The

retailer plans to engage its beef and dairy suppliers similarly in the near future.


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SantanderBrasil was

picked out forits Reduza e

Compense CO2programme

Consumers are arguably one of the hardest groups to engage. Beyond

the hard core of eco shoppers, who actively look for sustainable productsand services, most dont take much note. So how can you raise consumers

awareness and nudge them to buy and act

more sustainably?

One impressive effort comes from B&Q, which

was highly commended in the Best Consumer

Engagement Campaign category. The retailers

three-month Great British Bee Count campaign

caught the judges attention for its grassroots

nature and its clear consumer focus. Run in part-

nership with Friends of the Earth, the campaigninvited members of the public to download a

dedicated smartphone app and to share bee

sightings via social media. Within a week of its

launch in June 2014, the app had almost 20,000

registered users and almost half a million bees

were logged.

Another move that caused big ripples among

consumers was the decision by US pharmacy

chain CVS Caremark to stop selling tobacco

products in its 7,600 stores. The bold move,

which won a special mention from the judges, garnered 350,000 likes on

Facebook and 218m print and broadcast media impressions. In addition, one

in four consumers surveyed said they were more likely to shop at CVS Care-

mark as a result.

The top prize in the consumer engagement category went to another stellar

performer: Santander Brasil. The Brazilian bank the second to be singled

out at this years awards was picked out for its Reduza e Compense CO2

programme. The scheme provides a pioneering bargaining platform that sets

out to break the dominance of institutional investors in the carbon market andopen it up to individuals or enterprises. Anyone can log on to the web-based

initiative, calculate their carbon footprint and then acquire the corresponding

carbon credits on the voluntary market for projects.

Crucial in the success of the programme was Santander Brasils ability to

win over people to the idea of carbon offsetting, which it did through instruc-

tive and light-hearted videos. To show it was serious, the bank also undertook

to offset the first 1,000km of each vehicle in the companys fleet. Santander

Brasil also hosts an app on its corporate Facebook page (which has over 1

million followers), which shows the amount of carbon that users have emitted

by browsing on the social media site.


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PureCircleszero-calorie

sweetenerhas an 85%

smaller carbonfootprint than

natural caloricsweeteners

This achievement reinforces the pioneering nature of our initiative, which

aims to develop the carbon market, especially among those who are distantfrom discussions about the subject, such as members of the public and

small and medium-sized companies, said Marcos

Madureira, vice president of sustainability at the

bank, on receiving the award.

Companies want consumers to take action to

promote sustainability. And that action could be

voting with their wallets. Turning sustainable princi-

ples into a viable market offering is no easy task,

however, which is why PureCircles promotion of

stevia-based sweeteners is so impressive, and whythe Malaysian firm won the Sustainability Commer-

cialised award. The zero-calorie sweetener, which

represents an entire new category, is proven to have

an 85% smaller carbon footprint than natural caloric

sweeteners such as sugar cane and beet sugar. Its

water footprint is even better, comprising a mere 5%

that of the average sweetener on the market.

Selected as Highly Commended once again

was B&Q for its easyGrow product, an innovative teabag technology used to

package bedding plants. B&Q sells about 140m such plants a year. Historically

they would be packaged in non-recyclable polystyrene trays. The retailers

new solution uses a renewable material based on corn starch. The pots are

filled with coir, meanwhile, a sustainable alternative to peat. Launched in April

2014, EasyGrow drove an additional 1m in sales within the first six months.

Leadership

The above examples all point to individual excellence: companies doing one

thing exceptionally well. But if the cause of sustainability is to make a real

indent on the worlds most pressing problems, it takes coordinated effortacross multiple fields. That is only possible with genuine, integral leadership

from the top of an organisation.

Mars Incorporated is one of those. The US confectioner took the award for

Best Private Company for an unprecedented second year running. Last year

Mars was praised for its work on tackling child labour in the cocoa industry

in West Africa, and this year the judges highlighted its development of a new

deforestation policy and its underwriting of the new 200MW wind farm in Texas

(as cited above).

The benefit for Mars in being a private company is the ability to take the

long-term perspective, said Kristen Kinkella, corporate affairs director for Mars


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MBA Polymers

is developinghigh-qualitypost-consumer

recycledplastics

UK. We look at sustainability, like many other companies, as key to our future

success and leaving the world better than when we found it.

Highly Commended in this category is Roshan, the largest telecoms

provider in Afghanistan. The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development holds

a controlling 51% stake in the firm, ensuring that social and economic develop-

ment are hard wired into the companys business model. The judges praised

its positive contribution to society in Afghanistan against all the odds.

MBA Polymers, meanwhile, walked away with the award for Best SME

(small or medium-sized enterprise). Less than one tenth of the 280m tonnes of

plastic produced annually are recycled. This small Worksop-based firm, which

began life in a Californian garage more than 20 years ago, is leading the wayin developing high-quality post-consumer recycled plastics. The companys

clients include HP, Nespresso and Electrolux.

Scotland-based Elan Hair Design was Highly Commended for its

eco-friendly practices, which stretch to sending its clients shorn locks for

composting, while the Mad Monkey Hostel in Cambodia won special mention

for its commitment to social responsibility.

Behind every great company is a great leader. B&Qs appearance in

several of the category shortlists made Matt Sexton, the driving force behind

the companys One Planet Home programme, a worthy winner of the Head of

Sustainability of the Year award.


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Accepting the accolade, Sexton was quick to credit his colleagues.

Theres an enormous amount of goodwill among B&Qs employees, he said.

A personal mission to reduce the level of toxic chemical in paints drew him

from a career as a buyer into sustainability. He summarises his job succinctly:

taking all the things that people are doing at B&Q and trying to get them to

do it in a slightly different, more responsible way.

Head of Sustainability of the Year: Matt Sexton, B&Q

The energy and inspiration that Matt Sexton has given to B&Qs One Planet Home programme

over the past six years earned him this years coveted Head of Sustainability of the Year award.

The accolade is richly deserved. Under Sextons leadership, the iconic DIY brand has

reduced its carbon footprint by 30% (saving the retailer more than 66m in the process),

diverted 90% of waste from landfill and reduced paint solvents by more than 60%.

Sexton is quick to give credit to his fellow employees. Not a fan of centralised objectives,

he prefers to think of One Planet

Home the name B&Q gives to

its company-wide sustainability

programme as more of a move-ment. We have advocates in most

departments across the business.

I like to think of them as a group

of people who all share a similar

goal.

His achievements speak of an

ability to get employees on board.

One way of doing that is never to

miss an opportunity to communi-

cate. At Sextons insistence, the

One Planet Home logo was woven

onto 30,000 new uniforms. Every

new recruit also gets trained in

B&Qs sustainability practices as

part of their induction. Whether its the internal television system or a company newspaper,

well get our message in there, he says. And were very consistent. So we say, This is One

Planet. This is what we do.

Another secret to his success is to let the experts get on with what they are expert at. So,

yes, we have an emission goal around haulage, but I know absolutely nothing about trucks,he admits. Yet within B&Qs 30,000 workforce, there are all the specialists you could want. If

we can inspire them and get them on board, then they become real champions.


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Yes Banks CEO

has institutedResponsible

Banking as astrategic unit

with the bank

As for the prestigious CEO of the Year, the award for 2014 went to Rana

Kapoor at Yes Bank. Under Kapoors leadership, Yes Bank has emerged as

Indias fourth largest private sector bank. But its done so while retaining

a clear social mission. Among other measures, Yes Banks CEO has

instituted Responsible Banking as a strategic unit with the bank. Kapoor has

also appointed Chief Sustainability Officer and Chief Innovation Officer roles,

rarities in Indias finance sector. The effectiveness of such moves is evident

in Yes Banks portfolio of services for the millions who are unbanked or

under-banked in India.

Kapoor is a firm believer that a business-like approach to development

will provide a secure and realistic solution to Indias sustainable growth. Hismessage to his fellow corporate leaders is equally clear: Integrating CSR prin-

ciples within the core business operations is critical for business sustenance.

One outstanding leader whose career is truly inspiring from her time

as president of Ireland through to her recent nomination as UN special

envoy for climate change is Mary Robinson. As the judges put it, this years

Lifetime Achievement award winner has embodied the entire spectrum

of sustainability.

Behind every accolade won at the 5th Annual Responsible Business Awards

lies a story of real innovation, genuine commitment and meaningful action.

Long may such efforts continue. n


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