Sustainability

Researchers and representatives from governments, mountain communities and private sector companies from across the globe met on June 4th to launch a major new centre for mountain research. The four-day Mountain Futures 2018 conference, organized by the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) and Kunming Institute of Botany (KIB), Chinese Academy of Sciences includes a visit to the new 200-hectare site in China’s Yunnan Province dedicated to developing innovative farming systems that tackle poverty and environmental degradation in the world’s mountain areas.

Farmers realize the importance of biodiversity. Thanks to the combined efforts of many groups in agriculture, farmers today have access to a variety of tools and practices that help them grow crops in a sustainable way that protects biodiversity.

Las Vegas Sands is the leader in sustainability within the hospitality industry. Through Sands ECO360, its global sustainability program, the company implements strategic initiatives that minimize its environmental footprint on the planet. Since setting the five-year goals in 2015, the program has made outstanding progress detailed in its 2017 Environmental Progress Report.

Melissa Nielsen, a project engineer for Tetra Tech’s Solid Waste Management Practice in Vancouver, Canada, discusses the roll-out of a food scraps collection program in British Columbia, Canada, and the resulting trash reduction and shift in community attitudes. Tetra Tech was engaged to perform a solid waste system assessment; provide strategy, design, and implementation support for an every-other-week trash collection pilot; and perform a door-to-door outreach for a municipality-wide food scraps collection program roll-out. All opinions expressed in this post are the author’s own.

GRI’s new task force is looking for solutions to support companies that are making their supply chains more transparent through sustainability reporting. They will be able to increase the effectiveness and value of data regarding modern slavery, for actionable change. Read more about how to join the effort to battle modern slavery!

Ceres and CookESG Research released a new tool for identifying corporate disclosure of human and workers’ rights risks and opportunities in annual financial filings. The tool covers more than 5,000 U.S. and foreign companies’ filings (10-K, 20-F and 40-F) to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The SEC search tool also expands Ceres’ work to address investors’ concerns about improving the disclosure of decision-useful sustainability information in mandatory filings.

April and May have been successful months for Schneider Electric, ranked twice for its corporate responsibility by non-financial rating agencies; ISS-Oekom and Vigeo Eiris. With 25 years experience on conducting an annual report on sustainability in corporate management, ISS-Oekom featured Schneider Electric as leader of the Electronic Components and one of top 6 French leader companies of their sectors among with: Valeo, Peugeot, Amundi, CNP Assurances, and Sanofi on ISS-Oekom Corporate Responsibility Review 2018.

The World Green Building Council recently released their latest report, Doing Right By People and Planet: The Business Case for Health and Wellbeing in Green Building. This report focuses on 11 case studies from around the world that highlight the ways health and well-being building features can "save your company money, make your employees feel healthier and more productive, and bring a positive return on your investment in a green and healthy space."

Las Vegas Sands' 2017 Corporate Social Responsibility Overview highlights areas of performance that best illustrates the company's priorities and successes through stories of community and volunteer outreach, leadership and developmental growth, adapting to a sustainable lifestyle, and more.

Every three years, Schneider Electric defines a new indicator to measure its sustainability achievements which form part of the Group’s non-financial results. The sustainability indicators are presented together with the Group’s financial information: by the CEO at the annual and half-year results, and by the CFO at the first and third quarter results. This integrated communication demonstrates Schneider Electric commitment to making sustainability part of the company’s long-term strategy.