By Paul Eduarko Richardson
Accra, July 28, GNA — Dr Henry Kwabena Kokofu, Executive Director, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), says corporate social responsibility and sustainability commitments are critical to the nation’s development.
He said all industry players had a role to play to ensure that the nation’s resources were used in an environmentally sound manner.
“Our collective responsibility to protect and preserve our environment has never been more critical than it is at this moment in history,” he said.
Dr Kokofu said this in a message delivered on his behalf at the 10th National Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Sustainability Conference organised in Accra by the Centre for CSR West Africa.
Under the theme: “Shaping the future of businesses sustainably, post COVID-19”, the event brought together some leading multinational companies and organisations to showcase their CSR and sustainability strategies and practices and to provide a platform for businesses to exchange ideas on how they could grow sustainably in the face of challenges.
Dr Kokofu noted that Ghana had made enormous gains in economic development over the past decades, yet those gains had not accelerated the pace of sustainable development of the country as expected.
That, he said was due to several environmental challenges across all sectors of the economy, including deforestation, air and water pollution, coastal and marine degradation, loss of biodiversity, climate change, illegal mining, noise nuisance and urban sprawl.
Mr Richard Ansong, Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) said businesses must integrate sustainability factors into their core strategy to survive and thrive.
He said global power shift, demographic changes, and technological breakthroughs required businesses to be sustainability-minded, stressing that employees, customers, investors and regulators had all become interested in the sustainability measures of companies.
Some socially responsible brands highlighted some of their CSR efforts.
Madam Rita Rockson, Foundation, Sustainability & External Communications Manager, Vodafone Ghana, indicated that during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Company helped through dissemination of quality information on the pandemic, contact tracing, facilitating working from home, maintaining quality of service network and transactions, setting up health care call centre, and providing shelter for victims of domestic abuse.
Madam Santhi Periasamy, Head, RYTHM Foundation, the social impact arm for QI Group of Companies, said the Foundation partnered with the ANOPA Project to carry out interventions using sports such as swimming, football, and basketball for personal development, promoting gender equality, peace building, school retention and inclusion among children with visual and hearing loss in Ghana.
Other speakers at the event included representatives from the Association of Ghana Industries, JICA, VIVO Energy, World Vision, and the Volta River Authority.
GNA