The G8 nations are to encourage developing countries to embrace
corporate responsibility by holding a ‘high level dialogue’ on the
topic.
No date or venue has yet been set for the event, but it
was announced at the recent G8 summit in Germany as part of the most
supportive statement on corporate social responsibility yet made by G8
leaders.
The G8 group of Canada, Germany, Italy, Russia, UK,
Japan, France and the US, whose leaders meet once a year to discuss
economic, trade and political issues, has rarely made mention of CSR in
previous summits. But this year the countries said they would commit
themselves ‘to actively promote internationally agreed CSR and labour
standards such as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises’
and called on companies to adhere to such principles (see page one).
They
also urged companies to sign up to the United Nations Global Compact
and invited all quoted companies in G8 countries ‘to assess, in their
annual reports, the way they comply with CSR standards and principles’.
Paul
Hohnen, special adviser to the Global Compact, said the statement,
contained in a summit declaration on ‘growth and responsibility in the
world economy’, was significant because the G8 ‘has never before
addressed CSR in any detail’.
However, the move was received
sceptically by Amnesty International, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace
and Oxfam, which jointly warned the G8 ‘not to resort to bland measures
and statements supporting corporate voluntarism but to back binding
international rules to make multinationals liable and accountable to
those they affect’. They point out that leaders of the G8 announced
plans in 2003 for a Charter of Principles for a Responsible Market
Economy that never emerged.
