Global Compact International Yearbook 2009
The road to Copenhagen is the catchphrase: Climate Change is the top issue of inaugural edition, on the market since 1th of august 2009. In a very personal and exclusive foreword, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stresses the urgency of multilateral action: „One underlying message of this Yearbook is that a global, low-carbon economy is not only technologically possible, it makes good business sense“, said Ban. „We need the voice and energy of business to help us combat climate change.“ Sir Anthony Giddens adds the importance of the upcoming Copenhagen Climate Summit: „It is an important year, and everybody knows it because it is the year of Copenhagen. It’s a key for climate change policy. I do hope the Copenhagen negotiations will be successful, but there are reasons I have to be worried. “ Another key issue of this edition is the global economic crisis: 2008 will be remembered as the year of crises. The breakdown of financial institutions and markets and the subsequent worldwide economic downturn have put the spotlight on issues that the United Nations Global Compact has long advocated as essential responsibilities for modern business and today’s global markets: comprehensive risk management, long-term performance, and ethics. Georg Kell, Executive Director of the Global Compact, writes: „Restoring confidence and trust in markets requires a shift to long-term sustainable value creation, and corporate responsibility must be an instrument towards this end. If the crisis is any indication, it is now time to build on the advances made over the past 10 years by companies and investors in the area of ESG performance and bring this discipline to the mainstream. “
The road to Copenhagen is the catchphrase: Climate Change is the top issue of inaugural edition, on the market since 1th of august 2009. In a very personal and exclusive foreword, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stresses the urgency of multilateral action: „One underlying message of this Yearbook is that a global, low-carbon economy is not only technologically possible, it makes good business sense“, said Ban. „We need the voice and energy of business to help us combat climate change.“ Sir Anthony Giddens adds the importance of the upcoming Copenhagen Climate Summit: „It is an important year, and everybody knows it because it is the year of Copenhagen. It’s a key for climate change policy. I do hope the Copenhagen negotiations will be successful, but there are reasons I have to be worried. “
Another key issue of this edition is the global economic crisis: 2008 will be remembered as the year of crises. The breakdown of financial institutions and markets and the subsequent worldwide economic downturn have put the spotlight on issues that the United Nations Global Compact has long advocated as essential responsibilities for modern business and today’s global markets: comprehensive risk management, long-term performance, and ethics. Georg Kell, Executive Director of the Global Compact, writes: „Restoring confidence and trust in markets requires a shift to long-term sustainable value creation, and corporate responsibility must be an instrument towards this end. If the crisis is any indication, it is now time to build on the advances made over the past 10 years by companies and investors in the area of ESG performance and bring this discipline to the mainstream. “
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Deutsche Post DHL<br />
Employee involvement in addressing<br />
climate change is a key aspect of our<br />
global GoGreen Program.<br />
lives through monetary incentives to<br />
purchase non-conventionally fuelled vehicles<br />
such as hybrids or energy-efficient<br />
household appliances. In addition, for<br />
every five employees who take part in<br />
the program, we donate US$500 to The<br />
Nature Conservancy’s ‘Plant a Billion<br />
Trees’ campaign.<br />
We are also making changes to our<br />
company policies to ensure that, over<br />
the long term, our consideration for<br />
the environment is integrated into the<br />
business decision-making process. In<br />
Germany, we have revised our company<br />
car policy removing the worst polluting<br />
cars from those available for selection,<br />
increasing the period of usage and maximum<br />
mileage, and included a provision<br />
to encourage and incentivize individuals<br />
to make more environmentally-friendly<br />
choices. By the end of <strong>2009</strong>, we will<br />
have implemented an e-Learning module<br />
to raise awareness of the climate<br />
change challenge. The goal is to help<br />
our employees better understand the<br />
importance of their role in addressing<br />
this challenge.<br />
4. Generating value at the market:<br />
Our GoGreen product portfolio offers<br />
customers services to assess, reduce and<br />
offset their emissions. For example, we<br />
designed a new refrigerated distribution<br />
hub for a key customer in the food<br />
manufacturing industry in the USA to<br />
maximize sustainability and energy efficiency<br />
by building it 30m underground.<br />
The facility uses 65% less energy than<br />
comparable above ground facilities; saves<br />
approximately 681,000 liters of fuel and<br />
reduces CO 2<br />
emissions by approximately<br />
1.8 million kgs annually. In 2008, we<br />
expanded our GoGreen carbon neutral<br />
service making it available in over 25<br />
countries in Europe and Asia. We also<br />
offer carbon consultancy services to create<br />
and execute greenhouse gas reduction<br />
strategies for DHL customers.<br />
5. Preparing for regulatory changes:<br />
We are engaging with the legislative<br />
process to help shape regulation that<br />
brings long-term environmentally-aware<br />
changes to our sector. It is clear that<br />
sooner, rather than later, there will be<br />
a price on CO 2<br />
emissions. It is important<br />
that in general, resources and CO 2<br />
emissions<br />
are priced adequately leading to<br />
efficient allocation of resources rather<br />
than to increased costs. By engaging<br />
with the regulatory process we want<br />
to be able to provide input to policies<br />
that could influence how our industry<br />
impacts the environment.<br />
Improving our overall<br />
environmental performance<br />
Although climate change is our largest<br />
environmental impact, we are also<br />
addressing our other environmental<br />
impacts. We have implemented an Environmental<br />
Management System to<br />
ensure that we were addressing our other<br />
environmental impacts. To date, approximately<br />
46 % of our global workforce<br />
now works under ISO 14001-certified<br />
Environmental Management Systems. Examples<br />
of business units with improved<br />
ISO 14001 coverage, include our MAIL<br />
business in Germany that earned ISO<br />
14001 certification for all of its operations.<br />
The certificate covers over 159,000<br />
employees and is valid for 49 operational<br />
districts, which include 82 mail and<br />
33 parcel centers. DHL Express Europe<br />
widened its certification coverage from<br />
44 % of sites in 2006, to 80 % in 2008 –<br />
covering 43,000 employees in 717 sites.<br />
In Asia-Pacific, DHL <strong>Global</strong> Forwarding<br />
achieved certification of its entire operations,<br />
covering over 10,000 employees<br />
at 199 facilities in 14 countries. We<br />
will continue to expand the coverage of<br />
our environmental management system<br />
throughout our organization.<br />
Minimizing our use of natural<br />
resources<br />
We spent over €9 billion in 2008 on<br />
products and services, of which almost<br />
€2 billion was spent on energy (fuel and<br />
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<strong>Global</strong> <strong>Compact</strong> <strong>International</strong> <strong>Yearbook</strong> <strong>2009</strong>
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