United Nations Global Compact's support
Georg KELL
Executive Director of the UNITED NATIONS GLOBAL COMPACT
was the guest of honour at the 2008 GlobalCCU Forum held at
Campus Veolia and the Sorbonne.
"I welcome the initiative of Mrs Annick RENAUD COULON to organize
the first worldwide Forum on Corporate Universities. It is my hope
that this Forum makes a major contribution to spreading knowledge
of the Global Compact and its mission to corporate universities where
thousands of employees are trained every year. The Global Compact
Office actively participated in this Forum."
Georg Kell
Overview
The United Nations Global Compact asks companies to embrace, support
and enact, within their sphere of influence, a set of core values
in the areas of human rights, labour standards, the environment,
and anti-corruption. Following the success of the Leaders’ Summit
in Geneva in July 2007, which gathered over 1000 business leaders
and top stakeholders from the five continents, Georg Kell presented
the United Nations Global Compact at the 2008 GlobalCCU Forum, the
philosophy and the 10 principles of the UN Global Compact. Each Global
Compact enterprise commits to communicate each year on its progress,
the more employees are active in developing the 10 principles, the
more progress will be made. He also talked on the contribution he
hoped this Global Council of Corporate University Forum would bring
to the implementation of the Global Compact principles. GlobalCCU
supports the Global Compact. It is enabling the Global Compact to
reach thousands of men and women, who can in turn be active in their
own communities.
Content of presentation
Undoubtedly, in the past decade genuine advances have been made
by companies and investors across the globe to better understand
and address environmental, social and governance issues.
The United Nations entered the corporate responsibility realm in
2000 by launching the Global Compact. The initiative asks companies
around the world to voluntarily commit to internalizing principles
in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption,
and to enter into partnerships that help advance UN goals, such as
the Millennium Development Goals. Since launching, the Global Compact
has become the largest and most global corporate citizenship initiative
in the world with 5,000 signatories in 120 countries. In many cases
they have also joined together locally to develop country-level Global
Compact networks, which can now be found in over 70 countries.
Corporate Responsibility (CR) in 2008
- First, today Corporate Responsibility
is global. Today, corporate responsibility is at home not only on
the west coast of the United States or in the City of London, but
equally in Shanghai, Cape Town, Delhi, São Paulo and countless
other places, big and small.
- Second, global integration has triggered convergence around values
and principles.
- Third, Corporate Responsibility is filling governance voids. Corporate
responsibility would hardly exist if all governments were to act
in the best interest of their people. All too often, governments
fail to or lack the capacity to provide for essential public goods.
- Fourth, the nature of enterprise risk and reward is changing. Global
integration and value chains have changed the nature of enterprise
risk. No longer can companies turn to and take refuge behind a single
home government. A fundamental rethinking of how to evaluate exposure
to environmental, social and governance risks is underway.
- Fifth, non-financial reporting is on the rise. Companies around
the world are increasing efforts to publicly disclose ESG information.
And in 2005, the Global Compact instituted our Communication on Progress
(COP) policy which requires participants to communicate annually
on their actions to implement the ten principles.
In combination, these five developments provide evidence that a fundamental
shift has occurred over the past decade. Today a company’s
ability to compete, gain trust and ensure long-term financial viability
can more clearly be linked to issues of responsibility and public
disclosure.
Globalization Remains Fragile
 Globalization remains incredibly fragile,
and the creation of a global marketplace remains contested. Corporate
Responsibility will fail to flourish if basic norms of non-discrimination
in trade and investment are abandoned. The business case for Corporate
Responsibility cannot be adequately established in the absence of
competitive and open markets. Simply put, much work remains to be
done to lay the foundation for an age of global prosperity and peaceful
cooperation. There are many important next steps for to take:
- First, Corporate Responsibility must go much deeper and further.
While the Global Compact counts some of the world’s largest
companies among our 5,000 signatories, we know that there over 70,000
transnational companies and countless smaller businesses NOT engaged.
- Second, it is essential to nurture the emerging link between responsible
investment and Corporate Responsibility. This is arguably the most
promising way to more strongly establish the business case. More
efforts need to be made on public disclosure of relevant information,
and this information needs to be made more accessible for use by
analysts, civil society and educators.
- Third,
convergence must continue. It is now important to rally around globally-accepted
frameworks. Specifically, supporting the development of ISO 26000
as a practical tool for implementing globally established instruments – such
as the Global Compact and GRI – would
go a long way to build much-needed Corporate Responsibility capacities
around the world.
Georg Kell addressing attendees at the Sorbonne.
Visit United
Nations Global Compact website.
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