Australia Post Annual Report 2008–09

Corporate responsibility
Community investment
Australia Post is a generous supporter of
Australian communities. This financial year
as part of our broader review of corporate
responsibility issues, we developed a
community investment strategy that will
create more opportunities for staff involvement
and align our activities with our brand values
and business objectives.
As a result of these changes, our
community investment programs will
increasingly focus on:
• educating young Australians
• supporting community environmental
programs
• sustaining rural and regional communities.
Some key results for 2008–09:
• We invested $7.46 million in community
investment activities.
• We donated $1 million to the Red Cross
Victorian Bushfire Appeal and collected
$4.8 million in public donations via
our outlets.
• We recognised another 29 staff as
Community Champions for their tireless
efforts in giving back to the community.
Products and services
We are actively seeking to develop new
products and services that demonstrate our
commitment to sustainability and that also
deliver social and environmental benefits to
our customers and the Australian community.
As the provider of the nation’s letters service,
we have a responsibility to lead the mail
industry in ensuring that the environmental
impact of that letters service is minimised.
Hence, we have begun working with the
broader mail industry on a range of initiatives
that will reduce waste and encourage the
use of recycled materials in the production
of bulk mail.
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Australia Post Annual Report 2008–09 | Report of operations
During 2008–09, we changed our procurement
procedures and tendering templates in an
effort to deliver on the fourth goal of our
corporate responsibility strategy – to
“integrate sustainable sourcing across our
supply chain”. We also developed a code
of conduct, which is being included in all
of our major contracts, and which requires
our suppliers to meet a range of social,
ethical and environmental standards.
Some key results for 2008–09:
• We maintained very high levels of
customer approval, with overall business
customer satisfaction at 96 per cent.
• We increased the recycled content, and the
recyclability, of our mail packaging products.
• We began to phase out plastic shopping
bags at our retail outlets.
Environmental performance
At Australia Post, we acknowledge that our
operations and activities generate greenhouse
gas emissions, which contribute to climate
change. For this reason, we have committed
to minimising our environmental footprint
as the first goal of our corporate
responsibility strategy.
In the 2008 calendar year, our total Scope 1
and 2 emissions (combining our direct
emissions and emissions from electricity
consumption) amounted to 302,612 tonnes
of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO -e). 2
This represents a 2 per cent reduction in
emissions on the previous year, mainly due
to a contraction in overall business activity.
This year, we emitted 9.7 tonnes of CO -e 2
per full-time equivalent employee, which is
an improvement on last year’s figure of 9.9.
Some key results for 2008–09:
• We developed a Green Building Strategy,
which will guide our approach to managing
the environmental performance of our
real estate portfolio.
• There were no incidents or penalties
related to our environmental performance
during the year.
Financial and economic impacts
As one of the nation’s largest employers, we
paid our 35,509 staff a total of $2.17 billion
in wages and benefits in 2008–09.
Indirectly, Australia Post employs another
2,941 licensees, 28 franchisees, 637 postal
agents and 5,137 mail contractors. In turn,
our franchisees and licensees employ
thousands more Australians in the running
of their small businesses.
Members of this indirect workforce make an
invaluable – and unquantifiable – contribution
to sustaining the socio-economic life of
their communities.
Some key results for 2008–09:
• We contributed $4.3 billion to the
economy in labour and operating expenses.
• We provided indirect economic support
for 8,743 small businesses (licensees,
franchisees, postal agents and mail
contractors) around Australia.
The future
In the area of community investment, we
will encourage our people to contribute to
the community by launching a Workplace
Giving program.
Over the coming year, Australia Post will
actively seek to develop new products and
services that demonstrate our commitment
to sustainability, and that deliver social and
environmental benefits to our customers and
the Australian community.
We will also seize on our greatest opportunity
for reducing our carbon footprint by
implementing a number of facility-based
energy efficiency initiatives.