Case study: How GAR promotes employee health, safety and wellbeing
As a leading global integrated palm oil plantation company, whose activities range from cultivating and harvesting oil palm trees and processing fresh fruit bunches into crude palm oil (CPO) to refining CPO into industrial and consumer products and merchandising palm products around the globe, creating a safer workplace for all employees is a key priority for GAR Tweet This! (Golden Agri-Resources Ltd).
This case study is based on the 2015 Sustainability Report by GAR published on the Global Reporting Initiative Sustainability Disclosure Database that can be found at this link. Through all case studies we aim to demonstrate what CSR/ sustainability reporting done responsibly means. Essentially, it means: a) identifying a company’s most important impacts on the environment, economy and society, and b) measuring, managing and changing.
Abstract
Abstract
GAR manages 167 oil palm estates, with a total area of 485,600 hectares. Promoting a healthy and safe working environment for 49,000 direct employees, 67,000 smallholders and 58,000 casual workers is, thus, a key priority. In order to promote employee health, safety and wellbeing GAR took action to:
- introduce a new Health and Safety policy
- provide OHS training to employees
- offer employees access to healthcare
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With this case study you will see:
- Which are the most important impacts (material issues) GAR has identified;
- How GAR proceeded with stakeholder engagement, and
- What actions were taken by GAR to promote employee health, safety and wellbeing
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What are the material issues the company has identified?
In its 2015 Sustainability Report GAR identified a range of material issues, such as deforestation of High Carbon Stock (HCS) forests and peat lands, community relations and resolution of community conflicts, degradation of High Conservation Value (HCV) forests and biodiversity, free, prior, informed consent (FPIC) for indigenous and local communities. Among these, promoting employee health, safety and wellbeing stands out as a key material issue for GAR.
Stakeholder engagement in accordance with the GRI Standards
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) defines the Principle of Stakeholder Inclusiveness when identifying material issues (or a company’s most important impacts) as follows:
Stakeholders must be consulted in the process s of identifying a company’s most important impacts and their reasonable expectations and interests must be taken into account. This is an important cornerstone for CSR / sustainability reporting done responsibly.
Key stakeholder groups GAR engages with:
Stakeholder Group | Method of engagement |
Customers and consumers
| · Multi-stakeholder forums and industry groups · One-on-one meetings · Monthly e-update · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Annual Report · Sustainability Report · Social media |
Employees
| · Annual appraisals · Townhall meetings · Trade union meeting · HR training sessions · Surveys · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Social media |
Investors, banks, financial analysts
| · Investor briefings · One-on-one communications · Communication via email · Monthly e-update · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Annual Report · Sustainability Report |
Governments | · One-on-one meetings · Multi-stakeholder forums · Events · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Annual Report · Sustainability Report |
Industry bodies and trade associations | · One-on-one meetings · Multi-stakeholder forums · Events |
Local communities | · FPIC through GAR’s participatory conservation approach · Complaints handling and conflict resolution mechanisms · Two-way dialogue and consultation with community groups and representatives · Involvement in GAR’s community programmes · Involvement in the Desa Siaga Api programme to combat fire and haze |
Media | · One-on-one communications, briefings, interviews, articles and op-eds · Corporate events · Multi-stakeholder forums and external events · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Annual Report · Sustainability Report · Social media |
Civil society organisations (CSOs) | · Multi-stakeholder forums · Regular one-on-one meetings · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · GAR website · Monthly e-update · Annual Report · Sustainability Report · Social media |
Suppliers (including smallholders) | · One-on-one communications · Workshops and training sessions · Site visits · Questionnaires · GAR website · GAR Sustainability Dashboard · Annual Report · Sustainability Report |
Certification bodies: RSPO, ISPO, ISCC | · Regular reporting · Participation in working groups · One-on-one meetings · Roundtable meetings |
How stakeholder engagement was made to identify material issues
To identify and prioritize material issues GAR conducted a survey among external stakeholders and internal management. The external stakeholders – 119 people – consulted through the survey included academia, banks and investors, civil society organizations, customers and consumers, certification bodies, trade and industry associations and Indonesian and Singaporean government.
What actions were taken by GAR to promote employee health, safety and wellbeing?
In its 2015 Sustainability Report GAR reports that it took the following actions for promoting employee health, safety and wellbeing:
- Introducing a new Health and Safety policy
- GAR launched a new Health and Safety policy to:
- raise awareness of health and safety management among employees and related stakeholders
- promote compliance with government regulations and related guidelines
- implement health and safety practices as part of GAR’s operating processes
- identify and manage operational risks, to prevent and reduce work-related accidents
- constantly improve the company’s OHS (Occupational Health and Safety) performance through regular monitoring and evaluation
- Providing OHS training to employees
- GAR has approximately 530 dedicated OHS experts within its workforce and carries out periodic training for all employees, in line with national regulations. In 2014 and 2015, 6,890 of the company’s downstream employees were offered OHS training.
- Offering employees access to healthcare
- Committed to providing its entire workforce with access to healthcare, GAR has built healthcare facilities on most of its estates. The facilities are staffed with qualified healthcare professionals, who participate in regular training to improve their skills. At the end of 2015, the company had 150 polyclinics with inpatient facilities, 26 doctors and 291 paramedics, serving on average 1,113 patients every day. The medical care these healthcare facilities provide includes pre-employment medical check-ups for new recruits and special medical check-ups for workers exposed to possible health and safety hazards.
Which GRI indicators/Standards have been addressed?
The GRI indicators/Standards addressed in this case are:
1) G4-LA5: Percentage of total workforce represented in formal joint management–worker health and safety committees that help monitor and advise on occupational health and safety programs – the updated GRI Standard is: Disclosure 403-1 Workers representation in formal joint management–worker health and safety committees
2) G4-SO1: Percentage of operations with implemented local community engagement, impact assessments, and development programs – the updated GRI Standard is: Disclosure 413-1 Operations with local community engagement, impact assessments, and development programs
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References:
1) This case study is based on published information by GAR, located at the link below. For the sake of readability, we did not use brackets or ellipses. However, we made sure that the extra or missing words did not change the report’s meaning. If you would like to quote these written sources from the original, please revert to the original on the Global Reporting Initiative’s Sustainability Disclosure Database at the link:
http://database.globalreporting.org/
2) http://www.fbrh.co.uk/en/global-reporting-initiative-gri-g4-guidelines-download-page
3) https://g4.globalreporting.org/Pages/default.aspx
4) https://www.globalreporting.org/standards/gri-standards-download-center/
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