Unilever Ghana has won the CSR Manufacturing Company of the Year award at the recently organised CSR Excellence awards
The Ghana CSR Excellence awards, modelled after the European CSR Excellence awards, seek to identify, verify, evaluate and reward socially-responsible activities of companies in the country as they contribute to the nation’s growth, sustainability and prosperity.
Unilever came up tops in the manufacturing category, having achieved the remarkable feat of sending zero non-hazardous waste from its factory — in fulfilment of its USLP goal of reducing its environmental impact.
To achieve zero-waste-to-landfill, Unilever adopted the four ‘R’ approach — reducing waste at source then reusing, recovering or recycling any non-hazardous waste that remains. It has meant reconsidering every material that is consumed in the factory — from reusing packing materials from supplier deliveries to food-waste from the staff canteen.
With the aim of helping one billion people improve their health and well-being, Unilever has over the past year through its multibrand behavioural change programme — Grow FM powered by Lifebouy, Blueband and Pepsodent — reached over one million schoolchildren, teaching them good hand-washing practices while promoting good nutrition and oral hygiene habits.
Through the Unilever Ghana Foundations’ social investment programme, hygiene stations were built for schools in the Tema Metropolis — impacting the lives of hundreds of schoolchildren; 120 women in Small and Medium sized Enterprises also benefitted from its women empowerment programme, wherein they were taught good entrepreneurial skills. The Foundation, through its Excellence Award programme, awarded the best female graduates from some selected tertiary institutions and also supported the National Science Clinic for girls in the Northern Region of Ghana.
“Our ambition is to make sustainable living a commonplace, and we are proud to be recognised by the CSR Excellence Awards for our unwavering pursuit of total sustainability,” said Gabriel Opoku-Asare, Head of Corporate Affairs at Unilever Ghana.