Month: February 2023

COLUMBUS, Ohio, February 21, 2023 /3BL Media/ – Bath & Body Works today announced that it was recognized by Forbes as one of America’s best large employers. Forbes partnered with market research firm Statista to compile the list, and the ranking is based on a survey of about 45,000 workers at American companies and institutions with 5,000 or more employees.

Participants were asked if they would recommend their current employers to friends and family (on a scale of 0 to 10), and to cite any other employer they would also recommend. The final list ranks the 500 large employers that received the most recommendations.

“We’re thrilled to be recognized as one of the best large employers in the country,” says Bath & Body Works Chief Human Resources Officer Deon Riley. “We’ve worked hard to create a culture where everyone belongs, and we will continue taking strides to make Bath & Body Works a great place to work.”

For information on careers at Bath & Body Works, visit bathandbodyworks.com.

 

ABOUT BATH & BODY WORKS 
We make the world a brighter, happier place through the power of fragrance. Bath & Body Works is a global leader in personal care and home fragrance, including the #1 selling collections for fine fragrance mist, body lotion and body cream, 3-wick candles, home fragrance diffusers and liquid hand soap. Powered by agility and innovation, the company’s predominantly U.S.- based supply chain enables the company to deliver quality, on-trend luxuries at affordable prices. Bath & Body Works serves and delights customers however and wherever they want to shop, from welcoming, in-store experiences at more than 1,770 company-operated Bath & Body Works locations in the U.S. and Canada and more than 360 international franchised locations to an online storefront at bathandbodyworks.com.

For more information, please contact: 
Bath & Body Works, Inc.: 
Media Relations 
Emmy Beach 
Communications@bbw.com

TULSA, Okla., February 21, 2023 /3BL Media/ – When it comes to pizza, Hormel Foods is an expert, so joining forces with the World Pizza Champions to set the record for the world’s largest in-person pizza party was a no-brainer.

As many may know, Hormel Foods holds the record for the world’s largest virtual pizza party. Plus, it was all being done to help Make-A-Wish, an organization that serves to make dreams come true for ill children and their families.

The in-person event was built around the objectives of having fun, helping kids and gathering 40 of the greatest pizza-makers in the world to enjoy a truly unforgettable experience.

“This was truly an amazing event celebrating pizza, raising money for Make-A-Wish and continuing to grow our partnership with the World Pizza Champions team,” said Colby Strilaeff, brand manager of pizza toppings for Foodservice.

The University of Tulsa in Oklahoma hosted the world-record attempt last week, and Hormel Foods sponsored the party with a $10,000 donation to Make-A-Wish in partnership with The World Pizza Champions. Attendees were invited to donate to Make-A-Wish during the event.

St. Elmo Brady may not be a household name for all Americans, but his influence in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), with expertise in chemistry, endures to this day. Born in 1884, Brady was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. in chemistry. His legacy, however, would be defined by what followed. Opting for academia over private industry, he dedicated his career to building chemistry and STEM programs at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). His impact is still felt at institutions such as Tuskegee University, Howard University, Fisk University, and Tougaloo College.

As we celebrate Black History Month, St. Elmo Brady’s career serves as a reminder that we not only have a responsibility to honor the pioneers of our history but also a duty to carry on their work for future generations. 

Although STEM industries have come a long way thanks to luminaries like Brady, Black Americans remain underrepresented in the STEM workforce. Black workers represent just 9% of the overall STEM workforce in the United States.  Drill down further into the numbers and you’ll see even greater disparity in specific careers. Black Americans represent just 8% of chemists, 6% of life science jobs, and 5% of engineering jobs. Sadly, it is a similar story for Hispanics and women.

As a Black leader in the chemistry industry, I want to make clear that addressing this disparity isn’t about meeting hiring targets, it’s about ensuring that our companies and industries continue to grow and thrive.  When we bring together people from diverse backgrounds, we benefit from different viewpoints, life experiences, and ideas that can uncover new discoveries and innovations and help us solve the world’s greatest challenges. The reality is the number of STEM job opportunities is expected to grow by one million from 2020 to 2030. STEM-related industries will struggle to meet those workforce needs without fostering a larger, more diverse pool of talent.

We know the issue we are facing, but what’s the solution?

The first step is tackling the root of the challenge which, as St. Elmo Brady recognized a century ago, is a lack of access to education.

According to the Pew Research Center, both Black and Hispanic adults are less likely to earn degrees in STEM than in other degree fields. To change that, we as an industry and as a society must make strategic investments in early education to create that interest in science and develop future STEM talent in communities that have been underserved, under-resourced, and overlooked. 

At Chemours, we are doing this through programs like the Chemours Future of Engineering, Science, Trades and Technology (ChemFEST) School Partnership Program. Just this month, we broke ground on The Chemours STEM Hub at Eastside Charter School, a community STEM hub in partnership with Eastside Charter, a K-8 school in our headquarters community of Wilmington, Delaware. This investment is about more than the brick-and-mortar building. It’s about giving our students in underserved and overlooked communities hands-on experiences to spark a passion for STEM—a passion that may otherwise remain dormant.

By providing greater access to the sciences early on, we can help inspire students from diverse backgrounds to see a future with a greater variety of opportunities and pursue a STEM education in college and ultimately a career in STEM—contributing to a pipeline of the best, brightest, and most diverse talent.

Importantly, a commitment to a diverse workforce cannot end at the front door of a lab, building, or manufacturing site. It is incumbent upon our leaders to create workplace environments that are inclusive and equal—ones where every person is treated with dignity regardless of race, culture, religion, creed, or sexual orientation. This underscores the importance of creating a culture of holistic safety—including emotional and psychological health—as well as Employee Resource Groups which foster employee connectivity and mutual understanding. These aspects of the workplace are critical to recruiting and retaining highly capable, diverse talent and helping them achieve their full potential. They also create an environment where every person can be their authentic self, which helps individuals and ultimately companies (STEM-related and otherwise) perform better. 

Our nation has come a long way in bringing more diversity into STEM fields, but we still have further to go on this journey. Sometimes that means we need to look to our past for guidance and inspiration.

Today at Fisk University—an HBCU in Nashville, TN—students walking around campus may pass by Talley-Brady Hall—a recognition of the contributions of St. Elmo Brady and fellow chemistry professor Thomas Talley. Throughout U.S. history and into the modern day, you will find similar stories of Black visionaries in chemistry, engineering, medicine, mathematics, and other STEM fields. They changed the world through their innovative work and their struggle to break down barriers for those who followed. During this Black History Month and beyond, we can honor these pioneers by continuing their work to inspire a more diverse and inclusive future for the next generation of leaders, innovators, and problem-solvers.

Mark Newman is the President and CEO of The Chemours Company. In 2022, Mr. Newman was named one of Savoy Magazine’s Most Influential Black Executives in Corporate America.

In a world changed forever by the COVID-19 pandemic, I am proud of how the Sappi family came together last year to forge ahead, prosper, and even flourish.

More than a year ago, we set our ambitious Thrive25 sustainability targets to align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs), making them relevant to us locally and globally. Completing our initial year working toward these 2025 targets, I am excited that we met or exceeded most of our goals.

Let me make this real for a moment: our improvement in energy efficiency from the 2019 baseline is enough to electrify over 80,000 homes for a year. Our reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, off this same baseline, is equivalent to annually removing over 24,000 cars from our highways. This does not happen without a strong plan to meet these goals, and more importantly, it can only happen with dedicated employees to execute that plan. We accomplished our goals against the difficulties of the COVID pandemic and continual challenges to employee wellness—a real testament to Sappi’s adaptability and perseverance.

Over the past year, we purposely accelerated our efforts to weave together a strong network of teams focused on our sustainability ambitions. It has been rewarding to see the level of cross-functional collaboration in pursuit of our mission to benefit people, take care of the planet, and achieve prosperity.

This company-wide effort included contributions from talented sustainability ambassadors at our sites, functional teams within Sappi, and our relationships with suppliers and other value chain partners.

It is clear that sustainability is a central part of Sappi’s integrated business strategy, which strives to expand our role in building a more circular economy.

For any company to advance, a solid foundation is needed. Looking forward, I am confident in the cross-functional foundation we have built to drive our next level of sustainability work. Despite our achievements, we have much work to do. We must commit to further decarbonization through the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) and continue our efforts to meet our full complement of 2025 sustainability goals, including diversity in the workforce, and employee and community engagement. In the coming year, we will continue to concentrate on the framework for climate-related financial disclosures (TCFD) to ensure proper climate risk management.

As always, this work will be done in the context of focusing on critical customer needs. I look forward to using our strong position on sustainability to collaborate, introduce new products, and drive improvements across the value chain.

Our company purpose remains our guiding force: to build a thriving world by unlocking the power of renewable resources to benefit people, communities, and the planet. We are living this purpose more and more each day.

KOHLER, Wis., February 21, 2023 /3BL Media/ – Kohler Co., a global leader in kitchen and bath products, luxury decorative brands, energy resiliency, and hospitality was honored with the National Kitchen and Bath Association (NKBA) Best of KBIS Product – Bath Silver for Abstra tile by KOHLER WasteLAB at the 2023 Kitchen and Bath Industry Show (KBIS) in Las Vegas. Kohler featured its Believing in Better sustainability and social impact platform in its KBIS booth, highlighting initiatives from safe water projects to sustainable product design. Other top recognitions for Kohler included NKBA Best of Show booth award and the NKBA 30’s Choice honorary award for creative use of color.

The Abstra tile collection by KOHLER WasteLAB is a stunning series of bespoke brushed matte tiles for residential and commercial installations, made from nearly 100 percent recycled waste material. The WasteLAB pioneered a way to leverage the Kohler, WI pottery’s wastewater stream for Abstra’s tile body. Consisting primarily of pottery waste clay and glaze, the material is dewatered and processed into a useable base material. The collection is available in two different styles: Abstra Feature, which is a series of abstract patterned tile with raised and relief designs and an undulating surface; and Abstra Standard, an unadorned field tile with the same undulating surface detail.

Kohler’s Believing in Better display at KBIS included call outs to the company’s first ESG report, showcasing accomplishments within water saved through efficient product solutions, lives impacted through Safe Water for All initiatives and Innovation for Good products, as well as clean energy programs, and sustainable WasteLAB tile products.

KBIS additionally bestowed accolades on Kohler for the company’s impressive booth at this year’s tradeshow, naming Kohler’s booth Best of Show. The 15,000 square-foot space showcased the latest in design and innovation from KOHLER, Kallista, Robern, ANN SACKS, Kohler Lighting, KOHLER Home Generators, and Sterling. Throughout the booth, Kohler paid homage to its rich heritage, celebrating the company’s 150th anniversary. The booth displayed new and past iconic products, including an emphasis on its renowned bold use of color. The space also explored Kohler’s Believing in Better sustainability and social impact strategy.

The NKBA’s Thirty Under 30 Class of 2023 scoured the KBIS show floor to scope out products they deemed to be the best in six performance categories. The Kohler booth’s display of six Heritage Colors from throughout the company’s history helped to secure the 30’s Choice Award in the Creative Use of Color category. The colored enamel products spanned decades, having first been introduced into the bathroom in 1927. Visitors voted on their two favorite colors to be brought back into limited production in 2023 as part of Kohler Co.’s 150th Anniversary year celebration. Winning colors – Spring Green and Peachblow – were announced in-booth by Chair and CEO David Kohler and industry trends expert Sophie Donelson.

About Kohler Co.

Founded in 1873 and headquartered in Kohler, Wisconsin, Kohler Co. is one of America’s oldest and largest privately held companies comprised of more than 40,000 associates. With more than 50 manufacturing locations worldwide, Kohler is a global leader in the design, innovation and manufacture of kitchen and bath products; luxury cabinetry, tile and lighting; engines, generators, and clean energy solutions; and owner/operator of two, five-star hospitality and golf resort destinations in Kohler, Wisconsin, and St. Andrews, Scotland. Kohler’s Whistling Straits golf course hosted the 43rd Ryder Cup in 2021. The company also develops solutions to address pressing issues, such as clean water and sanitation, for underserved communities around the world to enhance the quality of life for current and future generations. For more details, please visit kohlercompany.com.

About KOHLER WasteLAB 
At the KOHLER WasteLAB, we look for ways to see the world differently. Specifically, we look to nature as a model for sustainable processes. Through nature’s cycles of growth and decay, waste simply doesn’t exist. The WasteLAB applies such an approach in its manufacturing process, using landfill-bound pottery, wastewater sludge and other forms of waste to design and produce stunning products. The KOHLER WasteLAB is just one of the several success stories to come out of Kohler’s innovative start-up Innovation for Good (IfG). For more information, visit wastelab.kohler.com.

Believing in Better: Better Planet, Better Communities, Better Lives 
Believing in Better is Kohler’s sustainability and social impact strategy and is based on the company’s operating philosophy that its best can always be better – for the planet, people, communities, and business. Believing in Better has three pillars: Better Planet, Better Communities and Better Lives. Through each of these pillars, Kohler works to develop products and programs that will have a meaningful impact, not only for its business, but for the communities it serves, and for the lives of the people who use its products.

Media Contacts

Vicki Hafenstein
Kohler Public Relations
Vicki.hafenstein@kohler.com

By Brandon Buckner

February is the heart of the winter storm season in the U.S., and electric utilities across the country are bracing for the likelihood of power blackouts.

When ice, heavy snow and high winds damage the grid, Leidos engineers are often the first ones called on to help assess the damage.

Why you should know: Winter storms, tropical storms, wildfires and other extreme weather events can have devastating effects on the grid and put lives at risk.

Power outages pose a variety of threats including water contamination, food spoilage, hypothermia, the loss of communication and the disruption of essential services.

Last year alone, weather and climate disasters in the U.S. caused 474 deaths and $165 billion in economic losses, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Leidos expert Thomas Cooney, who manages a team of 400 distribution engineers across the southeastern U.S., says hurricane and winter storm seasons are their busiest for disaster support.

From the source: “It all happens very fast,” says Cooney. “Once a major storm event hits and utilities need our services, we’re mobilizing within 24 hours. Out of respect for firemen, EMTs and police, I wouldn’t consider us first responders. But in these situations, I’d say we’re very close second responders assessing damage in storm-ravaged areas to get power restored to those who need it most.”

Cooney said he’s proud of his team and the role it plays to help restore power in desperate situations.

“Everyone thinks of elderly people in their homes during a power outage,” he said, “but it’s also critical to restore power to schools, hospitals and businesses. Leidos has more than a thousand power delivery engineers across the country who play an extremely important role in helping utilities ensure safety and survival during these emergencies.”

Looking ahead: Cooney said utilities are investing heavily in grid hardening efforts to mitigate vulnerability to extreme weather.

“When we’re not responding to emergencies, a big part of our job consists of constructing stronger, smarter and more resilient infrastructure that can stand up to extreme conditions and creating redundant power lines for when a primary feed goes down.”

Please contact the Leidos media relations team for more information.

International Olympic Committee news

A quarter of a century after hosting the Olympic Winter Games in 1998, Nagano is a confident winter sports hub, famous for boosting the country’s snow sports industry, modernising transport links and paving the way for successful Olympic Summer Games in Tokyo.

On 7 February 1998, 50,000 spectators and 2,176 athletes from 72 nations filled the Minami Nagano Sports Park to witness Emperor Akihito officially open the XVIII Olympic Winter Games. The ceremony sent a message of peace and unity, mixed with a strong display of Japan’s sporting ambitions.

Some 25 years later, the “Games from the Heart” are also remembered for raising the bar on innovation, the longevity of their venues, and inspiring generosity and volunteering.

Two new sports; curling and snowboarding, were added to the Olympic Winter programme. The programme was also expanded to include a women’s ice hockey tournament. In a memorable moment, Austrian Alpine skier Hermann Maier tumbled down the mountain but returned to the slopes to win a gold medal in both the super-G and giant slalom.

While Germany took home more medals than any other nation, the host country could be proud of their performance, earning 10 medals in total. Ski jumper Kazuyoshi Funaki won gold on the 120-metre hill and silver on the 90-metre hill. Japan’s only female gold medallist, freestyle skier Tae Satoya, won the moguls competition.

“Roof of Japan”

Backed by breathtaking mountain ranges, Nagano is often referred to as the “roof of Japan”. The international attention and global coverage during the Games was used to position the region as Japan’s leading winter destination, popular with skiers and snowboarders from around the world.

The mission to create an outdoor wonderland was enabled by reliable powder snow and the world-class facilities on show at the four ski areas that hosted Olympic events: Hakuba, Nozawa Onsen, Shiga Kogen and Iizuna Kogen.

Hakuba, for example, hosted ski jumping, downhill, super-G, Alpine and Nordic combined and cross-country events. And over the next two decades, it continued to grow, attracting flocks of visitors and holiday-makers each year.

It also managed to position itself as a holiday destination outside the ski season, attracting visitors throughout the year. Its outdoor equipment shops and numerous foodie destinations are famous across the country.

The site of the biathlon events, Nozawa Onsen, known for its hot natural springs (onsen) and for having the heaviest snowfall in Japan, is still popular in the country and internationally. Its 50km of trails and pistes attracted 420,000 visitors to the resort in the 2018/19 season, just before the pandemic. To cater for this growing demand, Nozawa Onsen upgraded its facilities in 2020, installing 80 new gondolas.

Individual venues continue to support the region’s status as a popular hub. The Nagano White Ring Arena, for example, which hosted figure skating and short track speed skating, is still a dynamic, multi-sport facility, used by local teams and schools. It hosts a variety of local, national and international championships throughout the year.

Meanwhile, the 35,000-seater Olympic Stadium operates as a home for baseball, hosting matches every weekend between March and November, and evening training sessions during the week in the winter.

Spectacular transport upgrades

As with Tokyo 2020, Nagano’s ambition was to dazzle the world with one of Japan’s biggest selling points: technology.

Its state-of-the-art result-publishing systems allowed Olympic results to be posted on terminals around the city pretty much immediately. And this involved more than 700 college students typing and scanning in data.

Setting the scene for the 2020 Summer Games, Olympic sponsor Toyota introduced its latest sustainability innovations too. In Nagano, the Japanese manufacturer showcased its “hybrid” car fleet, which ran on electricity and gasoline to keep the carbon footprint down. Twenty-three years later, at Tokyo 2020, Toyota’s latest hydrogen cars helped to reduce the event’s emissions.

But perhaps the most spectacular initiative was the overall upgrade of road and rail links in and around the city. Carried out before the Games, these upgrades made the resorts more accessible despite the lack of a nearby local airport.

It used to take as much as three hours to travel between Tokyo and Nagano by rail before the Games, but the extension of the famous Shinkansen Bullet Train from Takasaki to Nagano cut the 200km journey time to less than 80 minutes. It was completed just five months before the Games began.

Two of Nagano’s major railway stations were also expanded, and the road network was upgraded. Expressways were built to improve the links with Tokyo and other prefectures, while local roads to link the resorts were built or widened. These improvements cut journey times significantly and, combined with other developments, still bring massive benefits to the area.

Sustainability

Environmental safeguards were already central to Games planning, and the Organising Committee implemented a series of green initiatives for Nagano too.

While skiing facilities and transport links were being improved, a special body was created to assess the environmental factors, influencing the choice of venues. The discovery of nesting goshawks at the proposed biathlon venue led organisers to move the event to an existing site elsewhere, and prompted the introduction of new wildlife protection regulations. Such actions helped raise environmental awareness among local people.

Games of peace and friendship

The IOC President at the time said at the Opening Ceremony: “It is […] our hope that the appeal of the 185 Member States of the United Nations to observe the Olympic Truce will foster international dialogue and diplomatic solutions to all conflicts, in an effort to bring human tragedies to an end.”

Some 2,000 dove-shaped balloons were released into the air, carrying messages of peace and friendship written by the children of Nagano. The message certainly resonated with local residents, who put on an incredible display of generosity and welcome.

The Games were followed by an increase in the number of volunteer groups in the city, many of which are still running today.

Ranging in age from 16 to 83, over 32,000 volunteers helped to organise the Games. More than 15,000 assisted with the Cultural Programme, and even more opened their doors for homestays. The volunteer groups each had their own chain of command, and were run from a volunteer centre opened for the Games that closed only in 2012.

Their involvement, and the staging of major commemorative events, helped to create a positive perception of the Games among local residents, a large majority of whom believe the event was worth staging.

The first global Olympic education programme, One School, One Country, gave Nagano schoolchildren the chance to find out about other countries and broaden their cultural awareness, all in the interests of peace and friendship between nations. The programme continues to this day.

This year, for the 20th time, the city’s nearly 1,400-year-old Zenko-ji Temple will commemorate the Games with a Lantern Festival – a series of night-time events that includes the lighting of the temple and colourful lights and lanterns throughout the city.

Society is increasingly concerned about how business activities can impact people, communities, and the environment. Employees, customers, investors, governments not only expect, but demand, that companies integrate human rights into their business practices. In response to these calls, many companies now commit to voluntary initiatives, such as the United Nations Global Compact, and refer to human rights in their internal and external codes of conduct.

In our webinar moderated by Nate Kimball, Sustainability Practice leader, human rights professionals Sara Rowland, ESG Advisory Services leader, and Bradford Conroy, Senior Professional, discuss the latest in corporate human rights frameworks and expectations. Our experts explain how the business and human rights landscape is shifting from voluntary standards to mandatory human rights and environmental due diligence (mHREDD).

If you missed it, check out the full webinar on-demand below.

Watch On-Demand

What are Human Rights? 

To better understand human rights, it is important to ground ourselves in who has defined human rights and where expectations come from.

Human rights are basic standards aimed at securing dignity and equality for all. They are universal standards that, as stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, express the “…recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family [as] the foundation of freedom, justice, and peace in the world.” Human rights include people’s fundamental right to basic needs (like food, water, housing health, education, and work), bodily integrity (life, liberty, security, freedom of movement, and freedom from slavery, and torture), and civil liberties (like right to a fair trial, opinion & expression, assembly, belief & religion, association, culture, political participation, and privacy). These are the internationally agreed-upon fundamental human rights. These rights are stated and reinforced in 4 key documents:

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) – 1948International Covenant on Civil & Political Rights (ICCPR) – 1966International Covenant on Economic, Social, & Cultural Rights (ICESCR) – 1966International labor organization (ILO) Declaration on Fundamental Principles & Rights at Work – 1998

There are two additional documents that articulate the expectations for businesses regarding human rights that have shaped the legislative landscape.

The first document is the United Nations Guiding Principles (UNGPs).

The UNGPs were developed by John Ruggie, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Business and Human Rights, to implement the Protect, Respect and Remedy Framework. This framework is based on 31 principles that provided the first global standard for preventing and addressing the risk of adverse impacts on human rights linked to business activity. The UNGPs encompass three pillars outlining how states and businesses should implement the framework:

the state duty to protect human rights,the corporate responsibility to respect human rights,and access to remedy for victims of business-related abuses.

In 2011, the United Nations Human Rights Council unanimously endorsed the UNGPs, making them the first corporate human rights responsibility initiative to be endorsed by the UN. The UNGPs have gained wide support from states, civil society organizations, and the private sector, further solidifying their status as the key global foundation for business and human rights.

The second key document is the OECD Guidelines.

These are recommendations on responsible business conduct addressed by governments to multinational enterprises. They were adopted in 1976 and last revised in 2011. The OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct was adopted in 2018 and provides a useful 6-step process for conducting due diligence to understand the adverse impacts that a company may have on people and planet and how they can begin to address these impacts.

Expectations for Business 

The level of expectations for businesses can depend on a variety of factors. Below, the chart outlines the different expectations based on degrees of involvement:

Cause: the business is expected to cease or prevent impact and provide/cooperate in remediation.Contribute: the business is expected to cease or prevent contribution, use leverage to address remaining impact and provide or cooperate in remediation.Directly Linked: the business is expected to use leverage to seek to prevent and mitigate impacts.

Voluntary vs. Mandatory 

The expectations outlined in the UNGPs and OECD Guidelines are quickly becoming legal requirements. While human rights requirements have been highlighted most recently in the EU with the EU CSRDD and Germany Supply Chain Act, there are also important developments occurring in the U.S. For example, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and US-Mexico-Canada Act both aim to enforce the requirement for businesses to ensure that human rights are respected in their value chains.

Businesses should also keep in mind that they can still be impacted by regulations in other countries. For example, the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). As part of this directive, non-EU companies with a significant presence in the EU will be subject to the reporting requirements as outlined in the CSRD.

The spotlight on business and human rights is heightened, and we will continue to see an increase in mandatory human rights and environmental due diligence (mHREDD) measures. MHREDD is part of a directive intended to take due diligence a step further, enabling companies to focus attention on the most severe risks.

Ultimately, the takeaway here is that we can expect to see legislation and regulations grow. So, now is the time to prepare and begin incorporating human rights considerations into your business operations.

Getting Started in Your Business 

Human rights issues can seem overwhelming, but beginning by understanding the UNGPs is a great place to start. Not only will this help you understand how human rights apply to your business’s operations, but it can also help you to understand where human rights expectations come from and how they apply to all of us. The UNGPs reporting framework is an excellent resource to find guidance on the 31 principles and how to report on them.

You can then begin to explore the adverse impacts your business operations are having on people and the planet.

Keep in mind, this won’t happen overnight.

Start by mapping out your value chain to the extent that you can and from there, break the value chain up into “nodes.” For each node in your value chain identify which groups of people are involved and how they might be impacted by your operations. Once you identify potential impacts, you can take a deeper dive to determine which ones are most crucial and salient to your business and begin to address them.

Another great beginning step is to incorporate human rights considerations into your existing policies and procedures. Start asking the difficult questions about how your operations are impacting people, directly or indirectly, and work towards resolving those impacts by updating existing policies. Remember, human rights responsibilities typically fall across the organization, so it may be necessary to involve a variety of teams (i.e. sustainability and CSR, business operations, legal audit and compliance, public affairs, investor relations, etc.).

The Value of Investing in Human Rights 

Trying to communicate the value of investing in human rights can be a difficult conversation to have with your C-suite. It can be helpful to break it down into two sides: mitigating risk and capturing business value.

Start by discussing the risks associated with human rights issues. This can range from risks to your brand reputation, litigation risks, and business continuity risks. All these risks pose a threat if not addressed and could lead to a loss of profits, customers, employees, and even partners and suppliers.

The second side of the conversation should focus on the value created by addressing human rights impacts.

More and more often consumers and other stakeholders are looking for companies to publicly disclose their environment, social, and governance (ESG) and sustainability efforts. Human rights can be one element of these communications. Companies making efforts to address their human rights impacts can use these efforts to drive communications around sustainability and ESG.

However, this can be called greenwashing if a business is not addressing their most salient impacts, once again highlighting the importance of understanding your businesses adverse impacts across the value chain.

Key Takeaways 

Human rights are becoming a standard that companies are expected to address and are increasingly used by companies and their stakeholders as the normative framework for evaluating social aspects of sustainability. Actions on human rights are moving from voluntary to mandatory, meaning that now is the time to take the necessary steps to understand your organization’s impact across the value chain on people and the planet.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed or don’t know where to start, don’t worry! Our team of human rights experts is here to help you out, wherever you might be on your journey.

About Antea Group

Antea®Group is an environment, health, safety, and sustainability consulting firm. By combining strategic thinking with technical expertise, we do more than effectively solve client challenges; we deliver sustainable results for a better future. We work in partnership with and advise many of the world’s most sustainable companies to address ESG-business challenges in a way that fits their pace and unique objectives. Our consultants equip organizations to better understand threats, capture opportunities and find their position of strength. Lastly, we maintain a global perspective on ESG issues through not only our work with multinational clients, but also through our sister organizations in Europe, Asia, and Latin America and as a founding member of the Inogen Alliance. Learn more at us.anteagroup.com. 

Many of us may be in the market to buy an EV soon, but one of our greatest concerns is where and how we can “fuel up” our new rides. Imagine making that transition not just for one vehicle, but for an entire fleet of more than 200,000 vehicles. Charging becomes an exponentially more important issue.

The electrification of the transportation sector is critical if we as a company intend to meet our carbon neutral operations goal by 2040. According to the “Pathways to Net Zero for the US Energy Transition,” by Energy Pathways USA, transportation made up 27.3% of the U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions since 1990. Therefore, electrification of the transportation sector will have a large impact on U.S. efforts to become carbon neutral.

Easier said than done, right? This is exactly why FedEx chose to invest in the Rocky Mountain Institute’s electric mobility data science project. This initiative is providing real-world data on how to electrify the transportation sector for fleet managers, charging providers, policymakers, utilities, and regulators. With so many stakeholders, the data is helping actors across the electrification ecosystem, including FedEx, determine when and where all types of vehicles will need to charge. 

For example, with our rollout of 150 EVs in Southern California, FedEx had to build out charging infrastructure at our facilities for these pickup and delivery vehicles – the ones that complete the “last-mile” in delivering packages to your home or business—to charge overnight at their home station. For long-haul trucking to move goods across the country, the nation needs an interstate charging infrastructure in the right place and the right time for the journey. According to National Grid (using RMI data tools), a long-haul charging station will likely have the electricity demand equivalent to that of a small town.

Additionally, as ports, airports, and states seek to become carbon neutral, knowing where to locate charging stations should not only consider driver convenience, but also where the grid is available and ready for the increased demand. As stated in the Energy Pathways USA report, “The grid will also need to accommodate more information, be more resilient, and maintain reliability, all of which will require significant grid modernization.”

The key factor recognized in this research was that data is a vital tool to help charging infrastructure keep pace with the transition to electric vehicles. Data from RMI is being leveraged by many actors, including policymakers, utilities, and regulators, to coordinate short- and long-term plans for building out the country’s grid. It is an exciting time, and this work can help inform future power generation and consumption.