Giva Blog

Many businesses are adopting environmentally sustainable work practises in an effort to become more socially responsible. IKEA has installed 700,000 solar panels to increase energy efficiency, RB has planted more than 7 million trees, and Olleco has dramatically reduced its carbon emissions by using food waste as fuel. These efforts sound impressive on paper, but can businesses actually have a lasting impact on the environment?

The Swedish town of Kiruna proves that businesses can greatly influence their surrounding environments."

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At Giva, we value businesses and initiatives that support corporate social responsibility. Europe's annual Responsible Business Summit, which will take place 7-8 June 2016 in London, gathers CEOs and leaders from 400 of Europe's most innovative and inspiring brands to discuss responsible and sustainable business practices.

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Sky, the leading entertainment company in Europe, has spent the past six years in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) to increase its conservation efforts. The company is committed to facing sustainability issues head on in order to make a positive impact on the environment.

Before Sky began working with the WWF in 2009, it had already been practising sustainable living in its efforts to become carbon-neutral, which it accomplished in 2006. This achievement inspired the company to look at other aspects of its work that had environmental consequences, such as paper usage from the printing of its monthly magazine. By later teaming up with the WWF, Sky hoped to exhibit its dedication to eliminating environmental harm and motivating its consumers to do the same.

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Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is rapidly gaining popularity among universities in the United Kingdom. Many schools, including the University of London and the University of Sunderland, have added CSR policies to their websites. In these policies, the universities state how and why they will contribute to a variety of social issues, such as environmental sustainability and volunteerism. Some universities have gone one step further and developed CSR courses and programmes. In 2003, The University of Nottingham became the first UK school to offer an MBA in CSR. Other universities, such as the Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, have followed suit. Corporate social responsibility is becoming an important part of university identities in the UK.

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Currently, the United Kingdom's Data Protection Act governs how personal information is processed and used by organisations and the government. The Data Protection Act is especially relevant to businesses that rely on IT software to store data and information.

Enacted in 1998, the Data Protection Act sought to improve data privacy standards and enable citizens to access and control their personal information. With the exception of national security or criminal concerns, all organisations that store any "identifiable" information, such as names, addresses, or emails, must follow the Data Protection Act and pursue the necessary measures to protect the data and security of users. According to the government's website, there are stronger legal protective measures and repercussions associated with more sensitive information, such as ethnicity, political beliefs, and health.

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Worth approximately £6 billion, the cloud-computing industry is gaining traction in an increasing number of UK-based organisations. Some 84% of UK organisations currently use cloud services as part of their IT strategy, which represents a near doubling of the 48% adoption rate in 2010.

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