Community

In partnership with the Nobel Peace Prize winning Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank, DANONE has formed the Grameen DANONE Foods Social Business Enterprise in Bangladesh. Funded by the Danone.communities initiative, this enterprise aims to provide a sustainable business that focuses on the benefits to the local community rather than maximizing profits.

Grameen DANONE Foods' mission is to bring daily healthy nutrition to low income, nutritionally deprived populations in Bangladesh. The manufacture and sale of Shokti, a mineral and vitamin-enriched yogurt, provides:

• affordable nutrition to those who need it most
• employment and economic independence to the local community

DANONE Way is a series of self-assessment practices that we adopt across all of our business areas. It’s designed to help us assess whether we are reaching our targets in all areas of corporate responsibility. These targets are annually audited to ensure they stay fresh, appropriate and achievable. We assess our practices in five areas:

Human Rights

We enforce a minimum age policy in all our businesses and ensure there is never any forced labour. We do not discriminate in any way and all of our employees have access to proper representation, no matter what level they work at. And we uphold the highest standards of health and safety in all of our operations.

Human Resources & Management

We encourage social progress by regulating our working hours and making sure workers are not exploited. We offer wide ranging compensation & benefit packages and invest heavily in the training and development of all our employees.

Environment

Our environmental protection policies are wide ranging and we take every measure to effectively manage our environmental performance and control environmental risks. We also protect our water supplies and their local communities and take precautions to ensure our packaging is as environmentally friendly as possible.

Consumers

We constantly monitor our consumer’s needs and make sure our products are of the highest quality and to a high standard of nutrition and health.

Governance & Relations with External Stakeholders

Our business principles are conducted professionally and ethically. And we ensure a high standard of corporate social responsibility towards our suppliers, business partners and local communities.

It is by constantly reassessing, enforcing and auditing the above principles that ensure we conduct our business in a manner where we maximize community benefits without losing sight of the need to continue to deliver profitable growth.

The results of these audits are published in the annual Groupe Danone Sustainability Report, which can be downloaded from the groupe website.

A new initiative, giving employees the chance to spend time on extended leave, doing something worthwhile.

Louise’s Sabbatical

Teaching English in South America

The first employee to take advantage of our sabbatical for charity policy was Louise. She taught children in an Argentinean orphanage for four weeks. While there she lived with a host family to immerse herself in the culture and had the support of fellow volunteers.

Our sabbatical programme is run with volunteer travel agency i-to-i. Employees are given up to 12 weeks of paid and unpaid leave and £1,000 to fulfil their volunteering dreams. Louise also completed a Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) course through i-to-i before the trip.

She says: “The kids had poor housing, the classrooms were hugely under-resourced and the town had water and sanitation problems. But I felt I achieved a lot, and it was great to try something new.

“I’ve never taught a class before and to get five year-olds to listen to me when they just wanted to play was a challenge. It helped to get to know the other volunteers as we would share our experiences and ideas on what worked in the classroom and what didn’t.”

The Dreams initiative is a chance for Danone employees to give something back to the community. Employees vote for the dream they consider to be the noblest and Danone then funds and supports that employee in their challenge.

Richard’s Dream

Cycling from Land’s End to John o’ Groats

From Dream to Reality
When colleagues nominated Richard to win Danone UK’s Dream recognition scheme they were fulfilling a dream he’d had since the age of 11 – to cycle from John O’Groats to Land’s End.

His 1,000-mile journey took two weeks and raised £2,900 for Derian House Children’s Hospice in Chorley.

The company gave Richard paid time off to complete the trip and worked with him to maximise the amount of money raised and to fund equipment. Colleagues also got involved, cycling sections of the route with him.

“It was the toughest challenge of my life so far,” says Richard (pictured left with a colleague). “I’ll be eternally grateful to the company for providing me with the opportunity and support, without which I’m not sure if I would have completed the journey.”

Carole’s Dream

Recreating the Journey of a Saint

A Pilgrim’s Tale
Carole wanted to live life at its most simple level by following the Way of St James from Puy-en-Velay in France to Santiago de Compestela in Galicia, Spain.

Her 900-mile pilgrimage took two and a half months in gruelling heat. She carried just a backpack and a ‘pilgrim’s passport’, which allowed her to stay overnight in pilgrim’s hostels. Colleagues’ families who lived along the route also provided shelter.

Carole says: “It was very hard to be left alone in the middle of nowhere at first. One of the things I realised is how few possessions you need in life. Everything you carry has to double up as something else – clothes as pyjamas, handcream as foot treatment and so on. If your bag is just 500 grams overweight it can make a huge difference to your walking speed and comfort.”

Kim’s Dream

Return to Saigon

Help for Fellow Orphans
As a baby, Kim was flown out of Vietnam on the last day of the Vietnam War to join her adoptive parents in Britain. In 2007, she returned, to trace her roots and help the children living in her old orphanage.

Go Vap in Ho Chi Minh City is now a special needs orphanage that also helps babies with HIV/Aids. Kim taught English to 11 to 17 year-olds with learning and physical disabilities and helped care for newborns.

“I’ve had so much support from my managers and HR to organise time off, the travel, and the collection and transport of toys and books,” says Kim.

Helping in the community was one of the reasons Kim joined Danone. “I love that people here really try to live the company’s values and that they care about the environment and community. It’s not about throwing money at causes but being personally involved, which, for me, is much more satisfying.”

DANONE has joined forces with World Vision to develop Volvic 1 for 10, a programme that will provide safe, clean water to villages in Africa by digging wells and assuring their sustained maintenance.

For every litre of Volvic water that we sell, we will provide 10 litres of clean, drinkable water to those who need it in Africa. With the basic necessities like cooking, cleaning and washing made possible from this initiative we not only promote increased health in these areas but also improve the general standard of living and aid the local economic and educational situation.

This initiative has run in Germany in 2005, in France since 2006, and was launched in Japan in 2007.

The target for Volvic in the UK is to:

• Build 22 wells in Africa over a 3 year period
• With the first 15 in 2008.
• Over 112,000 people benefiting
• Water supply designed to continue for the next 17 years

We aim to provide over 1.7 billion litres of water in 2008 with a total of 6 billion litres over the 3 year period.

Danone employees develop teamwork, planning and communication skills while working in the community.

Supply Chain & Operations

Danone’s logistical wizards lend the BCTV, a charity that runs conservation projects across the country.

Creating homes to roost

For their annual team community event, Supply Chain & Operations employees turned their hand to building houses. They built around 40 bird boxes at a nature reserve in Richmond and helped install some of them.

Tracy, from the team, says: “The box building was hilarious and competitive. First of all it was a race to see who could build the first box, and then it was who could build the most.”

Sales

Thinking on their feet for skin cancer

Bright ideas help skin cancer charity

While on a development course, our Sales department were set a surprise charity challenge.

Split into three teams, they were dropped off in Bournemouth and had to raise £3,000 for skin cancer charity Sunshade in a day.

Creativity and buckets to the fore they put legs on the line for sponsored waxings, held raffles and offered massages. One team even managed to set up a phone line to the Ealing head office so passers-by could donate by credit card. The total raised was £5,930.

Finance and IT

Teamwork breaks new ground

Danone on the farm

Members of our Finance and IT teams paved the way to success at Deen City Farm in Merton. They spent a day helping to lay a 30-metre paved walkway across the fields to allow wheelchair and pram access.

Organiser Nazish says: “It was very hard work but we had a real sense of achievement. We all had our own roles, whether it was filling wheelbarrows with sand, or laying the bricks. We had to rely on each other to get the job done.”

Human Resources

Helping children appreciate the natural environment

Exposing children to nature

Our HR team got back to nature when they took 26 children from Lark Hall primary school in Clapham to the London Wetland Centre.

The children were from under-privileged families and didn’t go on trips too often. They enjoyed the big park and were excited to see the birds. They also enjoyed pond dipping – where centre staff showed them how to observe animals in the pond.

Field Sales

Working with children to create an allotment garden

Links with school gardeners bloom

Budding gardeners from Ellen Wilkinson School for Girls are getting some green-fingered help from our Field Sales team.

Employees visit the school once a month to help the children design and plant their herb, flower and vegetable patches.

Richard, from the team, says: “It has been fantastic not only being able to help the girls but interact with them too. We spend a lot of time talking with them.”

Christmas parties and outings for disadvantaged children as part of a worldwide event.

A day for children to come first

Every year, Groupe Danone companies worldwide are encouraged to take part in Danone Children’s Day ¬and devote a day to activities with children. For Danone UK, it traditionally sees our employees helping to run a Christmas party for foster children or taking disadvantaged children on outings.

Michelle helped take 30 children to the London Aquarium and on a surprise trip to the London Eye. She said: “The aquarium was so much fun and it was really nice to see the kids’ excitement when they found out they were going on the London Eye.”

Jen helped decorate the venue for the Ealing Foster Care Association Christmas party and organise activities. She said: “I did the face-painting. The children’s joy when we finished and took a picture of them was wonderful. After what some of them have been through, a day like that meant the world to them.”

Helping schoolchildren with their literacy and numeracy skills.

School lessons add up

We have been working with pupils at St John’s primary school in Ealing since March 2005. Every week, around 20 employees provide additional help to children with their literacy and numeracy skills.

Numbers partner Leanne said: “Because I have worked with the same four children, I have built up a great relationship with them and we all look forward to seeing each other. I received great teacher training from Ealing Business Partnership, which helped me a lot.”

Fellow volunteer Liz adds: “The children seem to get so much out of it and I can see why so many people from the company are involved. It gives you the feel-good factor and helps with your own personal development too.”

Children’s Day

Each Year, DANONE Waters UK takes part in the organization of a Christmas party in support of Ealing Foster Children Association with help of DANONE volunteers. They decorate the room, animate the activities and prepare the gifts for the children.

Christmas Card

DANONE Waters UK supports Ealing Foster Children Association with our annual Christmas Card. Each year a unique card is produced in-house with a design created by one of our employees. The sum saved from the in-house production is donated to the association.

School Partner

DANONE Waters UK has been involved in the School partner program since September 2005. Each Thursday, DANONE UK volunteers become Reading and Number Partners, helping pupils at St John’s Primary School of Ealing with their reading and mathematics.

St Saviours School

With the proceeds from the sales of spare office water samples, DANONE Waters UK supports St Saviour’s school in Ealing by funding their basketball kit, equipment and lessons.

Match the Donation

DANONE Waters UK supports its employees’ charity initiatives by matching their donations. For every pound our employees raise for a charitable organization we will add another pound to their prize fund.

Give as you Earn

Our employees can make regular donations to the charity of their choice, straight from their salary. Payroll Giving is deducted from the gross pay before income tax is deducted. Employees can also give by opening a Freedom Account. The Freedom Account is their own personal charity account into which they can donate a minimum of £10 per month.