The Sustainability Learning Forum

Partnerships for More High-Quality Food

Dr. Wolfgang Große-Entrup, Bayer Group

Safeguarding food supplies for a constantly growing world population will be among the most pressing problems of the future. Bayer is providing an innovative solution with the program “food chain partnership.” This business model supports the United Nations Millennium Development Goal of fighting poverty and hunger throughout the world and contributes to sustainable development. more[...]

The Author

United Nations Global Compact Milestones

Matthias Stausberg, United Nations Global Compact
Dr. Elmer Lenzen

Following a call to action by then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the 1999 World Economic Forum in Davos, the operational phase of the UN Global Compact was launched on July 26, 2000, at UN Headquarters in New York. more[...]

The Author

UN Global Compact Milestones

Dr. Elmer Lenzen

Following a call to action by then-UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan at the 1999 World Economic Forum in Davos, the operational phase of the UN Global Compact was launched on July 26, 2000, at UN Headquarters in New York. more[...]

The Author

Stepping Up for Skills

Editorial Team

In difficult economic and social situations, education and skills give young people a chance to overcome discrimination and exclusion, obtain work, and play a fulfilling role in society. Helping people to obtain work and career opportunities is part of the Adecco Group’s core business. As the world leader in HR services, we have over 32,000 colleagues in touch with the tough challenges many young people face around the globe. In 2010, our colleagues went many steps further and took part in our first Win4Youth project. more[...] login_required

The Author

Stepping Up for Skills

Lilian Furrer

In difficult economic and social situations, education and skills give young people a chance to overcome discrimination and exclusion, obtain work, and play a fulfilling role in society. Helping people to obtain work and career opportunities is part of the Adecco Group’s core business. As the world leader in HR services, we have over 32,000 colleagues in touch with the tough challenges many young people face around the globe. In 2010, our colleagues went many steps further and took part in our first Win4Youth project. more[...]

The Author

The Global Compact at 10: Review and Outlook

Georg Kell, United Nations Global Compact

Looking back at the past 10 years, the United Nations Global Compact has left its mark in a variety of ways, helping shape the conversation about corporate responsibility and diffusing the concept of a principle-based approach to doing business across the glob more[...]

The Author

Overview of the UN Global Compact

Editorial Team

The UN Global Compact is a strategic policy initiative for businesses that are committed to aligning their operations and strategies with ten universally accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption. By doing so, business, as a primary driver of globalization, can help ensure that markets, commerce, technology and finance advance in ways that benefit economies and societies everywhere. more[...]

The Author

Georg Kell about the Global Compact

Georg Kell, United Nations Global Compact

Since the very beginning, Georg Kell has been Executive Director of the Global Compact. Due to his ongoing fervour the Global Compact today is fully integrated into the UN system. We spoke with Georg Kell about the economic crisis, the search for new confidence, and the renaissance of politics and ethics. His message is clear: We have to reward sustainable business models. And we have to take climate change much more seriously, or the future might be rough. more[...]

The Author

Visiting the Global Compact Office

Dr. Elmer Lenzen

When I went to New York in March 2009, it was during the peak of the banking crisis and the self-doubts of the investment sector. There was a prevailing certainty that one economic era had come to an end, but ambiguity as to how the new era would look. Some of these elements are being intensively discussed and developed at the Global Compact Office: It is about lasting nature, transparency, responsible merchants, and the respectful handling of our planet. more[...]

The Author

From Global Compact to Global Leadership

Prof. V. Kasturi Rangan, Harvard Business School

The global financial crisis of 2008 was a stark reminder of business’s role in society. When well governed and well led, the role of business transcends one of profitability for its owners and incentives for its managers. Its role is to create value for society. Profit is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Without profit, there is no growth, and without growth there is no development. But if business does not create value and instead divvies up the same pie over and over again for personal gains (remember the subprime mortgages, collateral debt obligations, and credit default swaps?), then it is bound to fail and cause havoc for society. more[...]

The Author

The Human Rights and Business Dilemma

Verisk Maplecroft
United Nations Global Compact (UNGC)

Human rights have traditionally been the concern of states, and international human rights law has generally been addressed to them only. As more companies come to realize their legal, moral, and/or commercial need to address human rights issues within their own operations and activities, they are confronted with a number of challenges. Businesses will have to come to grips with the human rights framework and assess how their activities may relate to it. Moreover, companies are often uncertain how to avoid complicity in human rights abuses and where, in practical terms, the boundaries of their human rights responsibility lie. more[...] login_required

The Author

The Global Compact 2000–2010

Prof. Andreas Rasche, Copenhagen Business School

Over the last 10 years, the Global Compact has grown significantly, both in terms of the number of participants and their engagement. While only a handful of companies and NGOs met on July 26, 2000, at the UN Headquarters in New York to launch the Global Compact, today (as of February 2010) more than 7,300 business and non-business participants are part of the initiative. more[...]

The Author

Sustainability 2.0 – Looking Beyond the Factory Gates

Volker Hasenberg, PE INTERNATIONAL
Celine Furnanz, PE INTERNATIONAL
Thinkstep

PE INTERNATIONAL is a leading sustainability consulting service and software solution provider. PE embraces sustainability as a strategic issue that will influence future competiveness of business and will enable a business transformation in long-term. PE supported for example PUMA in developping a new sustainable packaging with the help of a Life Cycle Analysis. It also helped NiroSan Multifit to build an eco-efficient production facility. more[...] login_required

The Author

Sustainability 2.0 – Looking Beyond the Factory Gates

Volker Hasenberg, PE INTERNATIONAL
Celine Furnanz, PE INTERNATIONAL

PE INTERNATIONAL is a leading sustainability consulting service and software solution provider. PE embraces sustainability as a strategic issue that will influence future competiveness of business and will enable a business transformation in long-term. As a globally operating software and consulting company, PE also intends to help companies worldwide, through its products and services, to become sustainability leaders themselves. more[...]

The Author

Factory of the Future – The Otto Grameen Textile Company

Editorial Team

Over two million people work in the textile industry in Bangladesh, with women accounting for 80 percent of the workforce in clothing factories. The clothing industry is one of the region’s key employers and plays an important role as a source of income for the poorest strata of society. These people need the jobs, yet all too often they have to work in textile factories under poor safety conditions for wages that do not even cover their basic needs. more[...] login_required

The Author

Advanced Search