Philanthropy

Around 70 partners in India visited the Institute for Mentally Handicapped Children (IMHC) and gave the T.V. room a makeover! The volunteers put on their mask, tapped newspaper throughout the room, scrubbed the walls with sandpaper and began painting! As a team, they were able to create a more positive environment for the boys! Kudos to our partners!

The Smithfield Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Smithfield Foods, Inc., is pleased to announce a $25,000 donation to the Luter Family YMCA to support community programs that provide children, families, and individuals the support and resources needed to be healthier, more confident, connected, and secure.

Often, children in foster care act out because they don’t know who they can trust. The trauma they’ve experienced, the reason they are in foster care, can be difficult for them to process. It takes time and love for children to heal and to move forward.

Aiden was just 6-years old and had already been in six different foster homes. That’s when he met a counselor named Craig. Craig could see that Aiden was lacking the love and attention that he needed to thrive. He knew that he and his husband Edward could provide that safe, supportive and loving home. This past April, the family celebrated the one year anniversary of Aiden’s adoption.

Today, Victory Junction, a children’s camp committed to enriching the lives of children with chronic medical conditions or serious illnesses by providing life-changing camp experiences, unveiled the Smithfield Foods Archery Center. The camp’s new indoor facility is funded by a $500,000 gift from the Smithfield Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Smithfield Foods, Inc.

More than 40 million Americans struggle with hunger yet nearly $220 billion dollars of food is thrown away in the U.S. each year.

Thermo King, the leader in transport temperature control solutions for a variety of mobile applications and a brand of Ingersoll Rand, together with the Ingersoll Rand Foundation and Feeding America, recognize the imperative need to close this gap and are pleased to announce a breakthrough social initiative.

Few of today’s CEOs earned their job because they were socially responsible and spoke out on hot topics. Yet key stakeholders increasingly want to know where companies and CEOs stand on critical social issues. It might be argued that speaking out is becoming a 21st-century requirement for the leaders of major companies. Data confirms a shift in expectations from the public: research from Weber Shandwick indicates that 47% of Millennials believe CEOs have a responsibility to speak up about issues that are important to society [emphasis added].

National Geographic has joined forces with the Breakthrough Junior Challenge, an annual global competition for students, designed to inspire creative thinking about science.

As a standard setter in sustainability reporting, GRI has a responsibility to engage in sustainability reporting and exemplify best practice in doing so. GRI is sharing the process when writing their sustainability report, the problems that faced along the way, and the solutions found. And it all begins with the materiality assessment. ​

What do ratings agencies look at when evaluating companies’ sustainability performance? We asked this from Vigeo Eiris, who also told us about the common challenges businesses face with ESG reporting. Listen to the full interview, alongside the latest sustainability news, in GRI’s newest episode of Beyond Reports.