The Global Compact two years on - a business assessment
Paris, 25 January 2001 - How is United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan's Global Compact with business faring exactly two years after he first issued his challenge to corporate leaders to join with the UN in a pact to promote a set of shared values?
The International Chamber of Commerce, the first leading business o
rganization to take up the challenge, sponsors a special section in today's International Herald Tribune that provides answers from both the U.N. and business perspectives.
The four-page section carries stories exploring how companies are responding on the ground to Kofi Annan's proposal that business and the United Nations should work together in the areas of human rights, labour standards and the environment.
Timed to coincide with the opening of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the ICC-sponsored section assesses the business response to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's Global Compact initiative .
The ICC special section in the International Herald Tribune is full of examples of how companies large and small are working with the United Nations, its special agencies and non-governmental organizations devoted to human rights and the environment to meet the Global Compact's objectives.
Secretary-General Annan is scheduled to give a progress report on the Global Compact to the assembled government and business leaders at Davos on Sunday - the same platform from which he first floated the idea of a global compact.
Writing in the supplement, ICC President Richard D. McCormick, an American businessman, says: "Businesses must balance a number of social goals, not the least of which are creating goods, services, jobs and profits for the people of the world. Without these things, a world with today's population would be neither safe nor pretty."
Support for the Global Compact has been growing since last July, when business, labour and relevant non-governmental organizations participated in a formal launch of the initiative. Nearly 50 multinational companies - as diverse as BP, DaimlerChrysler, France Telecom, Nike, Statoil and Unilever - attended the meeting to support the Global Compact and its principles.
Clearly the Compact has direct implications for labour and what is broadly temed "civil society". But the special section reflects a widespread view among business leaders that the Global Compact will stand the greatest chances of achieving critical mass if it remains a two-way compact between business and the UN.
ICC Secretary General Maria Livanos Cattaui says in an interview that the compact is gathering impressive momentum. "As long as the Global Compact remains true to the original concept of a voluntary two-way partnership as set out by Kofi Annan, it will continue to command business support. It could give tremendous support to the UN in fulfilling its mission."
Here are just a few business actions on the ground that are outlined in the supplement:
- Tokyo Electric Power Company has undertaken a raft of environmental initiatives - planting forest in Australia, improving efficiency of coal-fired power stations in China, constructing micro-hydro generation facilities in Indonesia, and technical support for thermal storage heat pump systems in Thailand.
- DaimlerChrysler has launched a Poverty and Environment in the Amazon (POEMA) project in Brazil, to produce natural fibres for use in automobile components and combat poverty and misuse of raw materials from the rain forest.
- Nike, which relies on subcontractors in its factories around the world, strives to achieve continuous improvement in labour conditions of all its workplaces through on-site independent monitoring. I
t practices zero tolerance for child labour and insists on strict adherence to local labour law regulations on overtime and days off.
- Ericsson offers telecommunications know-how for disaster relief in cooperation with the Red Cross and Red Crescent.
- WebMD is installing internet-accessible computers in the world's poorest nations so that they their health authorities can access instant, up-to-date medical assistance.
For further information, or an interview with ICC President, Richard McCormick, contact Bryce Corbett (+33 6 20 47 32 52) in Davos or Lionel Walsh (+33 1 49 53 28 23) in Paris.
Full text of the supplement from today's International Herald Tribune
ICC Global Compact pages
The UN Global Compact site