Community & contributions news and commentary – CCB 102
News round up from October and November regarding community contributions.
Commentary by Alison Braybrooks and Deepa Mirchandani
Charity and supermarket launches milk carton appeals for the missing
On October 27, the charity Missing People and supermarket chain Iceland launched a campaign to appeal for information for vulnerable missing people on the labels of millions of milk cartons. The awareness raised by the appeals aims to find some of the 210,000 people reported missing in the UK each year. Iceland sells more than 800,000 four pint milk cartons each week and Missing People is the UK’s only charity that works with young runaways, missing and unidentified people, their families and others who care for them.
UNICEF and Nokia partner to rebuild eight schools in Iraq
Nokia and UNICEF have launched a $1 million public-private partnership initiative for children in Iraq to rebuild eight primary schools affected by conflict, displacement and poverty. The project aims to reduce overcrowding in schools that are accommodating displaced children. Over 1,200 primary and intermediate schools have been rehabilitated by UNICEF since 2003, in an effort to boost enrolment rates, encourage regular attendance and lighten the load on teachers. The project, in its initial phase, will last throughout 2008. It will support approximately 6,458 children (more than half of whom are girls) and 307 teachers.
IBM launches new social networking site to increase the numbers of young women in science
On October 27, IBM, in conjunction with publisher Feminist Press, launched the website underthemicroscope.com. The site forms part of The Women Writing Science project, a multi-faceted initiative to involve young women in science and to encourage them to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and maths. IBM’s support of the project is set against a background of fewer young people entering into these disciplines and a decline in enrolment in higher education institutions in the US at a time when other countries are experiencing significant intake rises.
Standard Chartered announces $20 million for eye care to poor urban areas through ‘trail blazing’ Seeing is Believing initiative
To coincide with World Sight Day, Standard Chartered Bank announced on October 6 that it will invest $20 million over the next five years into the development of sustainable eye care services in less advantaged areas of twenty cities worldwide. The International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) has described the work proposed as a ‘trailblazer’ CSR initiative in the field. The bank is working on the implementation of the programme with the World Health Organisation and other eye care NGOs through partnership with IAPB.
On October 10, the BBC received the Investing in Volunteers for Employers accreditation for its employee volunteer programme, Connect and Create. This award made by the UK Volunteering Forum and managed by Volunteering England, was made in recognition of all the staff volunteers across the BBC that make a difference to their local community. Through the Connect and Create team, the BBC works with 15 key partners including organisations such as Action for Children, the National Trust, the Network and the Media Trust to provide opportunities for BBC staff to develop their own skills and creativity by working with a charity or voluntary organisation. So far, it has enabled over 1,000 BBC staff to gain new skills through volunteering, reaching over 2,000 people in the community.
London Benchmarking Group (LBG) is a group of over 120 companies that come together to better measure, manage and report on their community investment programmes. The LBG model involves collecting data on all aspects of members’ community programmes, allowing companies to benchmark their activity against their peers, their sector and ‘best in class’ organisations.Information collected through the LBG process reveals some important trends in the community investment sphere. One of the most significant shifts charted in recent years is the move from philanthropic donations to long-term strategic community investment programmes that engage employees, customers, the local community and other key stakeholders. At LBG over 70% of giving is now classified as strategic investment, with 20% of that as a commercial initiative at the heart of the organisation. Another important move is the number of members who now operate volunteering programmes – with almost all reporting some volunteering activity. In terms of employee engagement, LBG member companies have reported a 20% increase in the value of volunteering hours this year alone, with over 2.7million employee hours given by members to the community in 2007/8. The announcement that the BBC has been awarded ‘Investing in Volunteers for Employers’ accreditation for its employee volunteer programme, Connect and Create, is a good example of this newer style strategic investment to engage employees.The next big step forward for the corporate sector is to measure the impact of this increased volunteering activity. Corporate Citizenship is leading a project with ten companies to develop an impact measurement toolkit and programme wide indicators to help all companies and community organisations better assess the difference their programmes are making. At the same time, we are also undertaking research with Volunteering England and Capacitybuilders to develop practical solutions to facilitating skills-sharing volunteering. Both of these programmes will enable companies and community organisations to work together better in partnership to engage employees in community investment activities. The results of these studies will be available next March and will be featured in a future edition of Corporate Citizenship Briefing.
Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank support Help the Hospices
Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank have initiated two fundraising campaigns to benefit the hospice movement on both a local and national level. From October 6, collection boxes were placed in every branch of Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank with customers urged to donate their spare foreign change left over from holidays and trips abroad. The money raised goes directly to Help the Hospices, the UK charity for the hospice movement which supports over 220 local hospices in their work. Meanwhile, employees will begin a used stamp collection with all funds being donated to local hospices around the country. Each branch has been partnered with a local hospice – a unique aspect of Help the Hospices corporate partnership programme which allows businesses to support hospices at both a national and local level.
KPMG joins the Millennium Villages Project to help address extreme poverty in Africa
On October 10, KPMG LLP, announced a $1.5 million contribution over the next five years to Millennium Promise, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to ending extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa, to help support a Millennium Village in Tanzania. The Millennium Villages project—the flagship initiative of Millennium Promise, implemented in cooperation with the Earth Institute at Columbia University and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)—now reaches over 400,000 people in 80 villages across 10 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. In addition to KPMG in the US, KPMG International, KPMG in Japan, KPMG in Canada and KPMG in Russia are also providing financial and other commitments to support the project.
Ten years ago, if you mentioned the words ‘development’ or ‘human rights’ to the average business leader, you’d get a response that tended towards a variant of ‘it’s not our job’. Today, these two words have worked their way into the corporate language of those with global footprints and public commitments.The timing of KPMG’s $1.5 million pledge to Millennium Promise is significant as it coincided with the meeting of heads of state and business leaders on the status of achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Others such as Diageo, Vodafone, Unilever, and Google answered the Business Call to Action championed by Gordon Brown and UN Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon earlier in the year and pledged their support towards achieving the targets.Signing up to a series of pledges is all well and good but businesses need to put resources behind the principles to ensure that the goals are met. In the current financial climate this is more pertinent than ever before. Businesses undoubtedly make a host of contributions to society in the form of wealth creation, jobs, innovation, products and services. It is in the area of social investment and philanthropy that many companies feel more able to demonstrate their efforts – by building wells, supporting educational programmes, donating drugs and mosquito nets. However, there are more strategic ways in which businesses can facilitate change – for instance addressing poor labour standards, irresponsible extraction/use of natural resources, pollution and waste. The key challenges now, will be translating good intentions into practical action, and identifying simple measures to calculate impacts in a meaningful way. If companies fail to do this, NGOs will measure their progress for them. When those signatories of the Business Call to Action are asked what they’ve done since July 2007, they should be ready with a substantive response.
Ericsson spearheads MDGs awareness during Round-the-World Race
Ericsson, the mobile telecommunications firm have announced that they will raise awareness of the Millennium Development Goals in the telecommunications industry during the Volvo Ocean Race, the around-the-world sailing competition. Ericsson, alongside Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland and previously United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Jeffrey Sachs, Director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General will engage with customers and other stakeholders, to increase awareness of the key role that the Information and Communication Technology sector can play in facilitating human rights, ending global poverty and contributing to a carbon-lean economy. Jeffrey Sachs, remarked: “Mobile phones, wireless internet and Ericsson’s other technologies are being used in innovative new ways in sectors such as health education, and business development, in rural, impoverished places that would otherwise be cut off from the rest of the world.
Secretary-general and drug companies agree to boost efforts to tackle HIV/AIDS
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and executives from over one dozen global pharmaceutical companies agreed on October 9 that greater efforts must be made to combat HIV/AIDS, despite significant strides that have been made in improving access to prevention and treatment. Attending the meeting were 17 of the world’s leading pharmaceutical and diagnostic companies, including Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer, along with representatives from the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO), the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS). The pharmaceutical companies pledged to invest more in research and development of new HIV-related medicines; developing affordable means to diagnose HIV and tuberculosis; and prevention technologies, such as vaccines.
World leaders commit record billions to tackle malaria
On September 25, world leaders gathered at the 2008 Millennium Development Goals Malaria Summit to endorse an ambitious new Global Malaria Action Plan and committed nearly $3 billion toward reducing the number of malaria deaths to near zero by 2015. The funding commitments are to support rapid implementation of the new Global Malaria Action Plan, which was launched today by the Roll Back Malaria Partnership. Developed with input from more than 250 malaria experts, the Global Malaria Action Plan is regarded as first-ever comprehensive blueprint for global malaria control. The Plan demonstrates that by achieving the Secretary-General’s call for full coverage of malaria interventions by 2010, it will be possible to save more than 4.2 million lives by 2015 and lay the foundation for a longer term effort to eradicate the disease.
Prime Minister hails BT partnership with Football Foundation
On October 21 BT and the Football Foundation, the UK’s largest sports charity launched Communicating for Success: an initiative aimed at using the power of football to assist with tackling digital exclusion and improving communication skills in the UK. BT is making an initial first-year investment of £500,000 in the scheme, which will be matched by the Football Foundation. The programme aims to help people of all ages connect with the ‘digital society’ and make learning more accessible through links with football and other sports. Participants will have the opportunity to improve IT literacy skills and raise educational attainment, while also encouraging them to participate in football and sport through playing, training and coaching.
Co-operative Foundation grants top £1 million for region’s community groups
On October 22 The Cooperative Foundation, the community grant making arm of The Cooperative Group, announced that they had made more than £1 million available to local community groups across the North West of England and Yorkshire in 2007/8. Sarah Robinson, Charity Manager of The Cooperative Foundation, commented “with so many valuable projects out there, which demonstrate the cooperative values and principles of self-help, equality and democracy, we have increased our funding to ensure that these groups get the support they deserve.”
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