Our number one operational priority remains health, safety and the environment for the 20 million consumers who eat and drink with us every day.
All management and board meetings throughout the Group feature a health and safety update as one of their first agenda items. The Board reviews the Occupational Health & Safety and Food Safety policies annually to ensure that they each continue to reflect our aims and aspirations and to meet with current legislation. Supporting the Board is our internal Health, Safety & Environment Forum, made up of technical specialists from around the Compass globe, responsible for promoting policy, setting standards, measuring compliance and sharing best practice across the Group.
We believe that everyone at Compass has a moral obligation to safeguard each other, our customers and the environment by operating a safe, injury free and healthy workplace, serving food that is always safe to eat, nutritional and which minimises our impact on the environment. To ensure best practice, we developed a set of policies, minimum operating standards and behaviours in 2007, which have been steadily rolled out across our business. We are pleased to report that this year the first phase of the programme has been successfully implemented across 95% of our countries. Our standards are based on the strictest regulatory requirements and industry best practice. Indeed, world-class performance continues to be our aim, seeking over the short- to medium-term to set the benchmark for our industry.
This year, in line with our published 2008 commitment, we have worked hard with our internal stakeholders to measure, collate and report on our Lost Time Injury Rate (‘LTIR’) in a consistent way across all of our countries. This data forms the baseline from which to benchmark our 2009-2010 performance and we will update stakeholders on our progress in our 2010 CR Report.
Seiyo Food – Compass Group, our business in Japan, has been awarded an ‘Excellent Lifesaving Certification’ by the Tokyo Fire Department in recognition of our commitment to health and safety. ‘Excellent Lifesaving Certification’ is an initiative set up by the Japanese government to establish an effective emergency help system within private businesses. Seiyo Food – Compass Group has been actively encouraging employees to take the basic lifesaving certification and, to date, more than 730 employees have received the certification.
Health and safety have always had a special focus in our business and particularly for our Offshore & Remote site workplaces, where our customers demand the very highest operational standards. A good example of our success was receiving an award at the European FM Awards in June 2009, when our Eurest Services team won the ‘Partners Across Borders’ category with international client, Shell. In arriving at their decision, the judges took into consideration the strength of the partnership between Eurest Services and Shell and the joint commitment to achieve the client’s goals of health and safety excellence, consistent service quality and sustainable cost reduction.
At the Porto Trombetas bauxite mine in the state of Pará, the Amazon Rainforest region, GR SA, our business in Brazil, reached an important safety milestone at their site when they achieved more than six million man-hours worked with no lost-time injuries. At this site, we serve more than 4,000 meals and provide support services to over 6,500 workers every day.
