From our
Department Heads
Dr Mark Watson
There has never been such focus or importance placed on corporate sustainability and it is incumbent on us, given our belief in the power of business as a force for good, to create positive change to the benefit of our people, customers, investors and the wider communities which we serve.
SwireTHRIVE 2.0 represents the culmination of many years of trust and belief invested in our sustainability teams by senior leaders and the efforts of those involved in making it happen on the ground. With our commitment to Net Zero by 2050, we are now clearly on the path to decarbonisation. Going forward, our efforts will be heavily focused on areas that offer the greatest opportunities to achieving that goal. To this end, we will produce our first decarbonisation roadmap in 2022. In 2021, we reduced our operational emissions by 18% compared with 2018 levels by improving efficiency and purchasing more renewable electricity.
I am incredibly proud of what we as a team, both at our headquarters and operating companies, have achieved over the past year in such challenging circumstances and as sustainability issues become more pressing and complex. Delivering SwireTHRIVE will require bold decision making, investment, drawing on our experience and expertise and working with others. Our success will be judged by actions, not words.
Olivia Wong
The business case for diversity and inclusion (D&I) is stronger than ever as COVID-19 continues to pose significant challenges to our colleagues and partners. We are proud of our continued efforts to cultivate an inclusive working environment for all. This year, we rolled out our Parental Leave Policy, which recognises and supports all parents regardless of gender, sexual orientation and family unit background. Swire Pacific was one of 14 corporations in Hong Kong to receive an Equal Opportunity Employer Gold Award from the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) for our stance on gender, diverse abilities, family status and race. The award reinforces our commitment to D&I in the workplace, highlights Swire’s market leadership, and shows how we are using our influence to make a positive impact in the Hong Kong community.
As we move into the third year of our five-year plan, we will leverage staff data to develop our diverse talent pipeline, review our policies and progress, and strengthen collaboration between employee resource groups to enhance engagement while educating and raising awareness of D&I. Building a diverse and inclusive workplace is a collective effort that requires participation from everyone. Through SwireTHRIVE, we strive to engage every Swire employee to be an ambassador for inclusion and to celebrate diversity.
Tom Cohen
Health and safety is a top priority for us as we strive towards our aspirational goal of achieving zero harm. This objective underpins our approach to safety management.
The challenges of dealing with COVID-19 have been significant. Our commitment to protecting the health of our stakeholders has remained steadfast, so we have adapted by introducing effective mitigations during these extraordinary times. We have worked hard to keep the company and all with whom we do business safe and healthy. These efforts have strengthened our business resilience and resulted in an increased focus on staff wellbeing.
Our refreshed approach to risk governance has seen the launch of a new risk forum which oversees both human resources and health and safety. Its focus is to identify emerging risk issues and opportunities in these two interrelated areas.
We recognise the importance of ensuring contractor safety. This is reflected in enhanced monitoring and reporting on contractor safety programmes as we continue to adopt a more holistic and integrated approach to our safety strategy.
As we look forward, we are committed to continuously improving safety training throughout the company as we believe this is a fundamental component to building a sustainable safety culture.
Tina Chan
2021 was an exciting year when we fully rolled out the TrustTomorrow initiative in celebration of Swire’s 150th anniversary in Hong Kong. The additional HK$150 million injected to the Swire Trust has enabled us to partner with 30 more NGOs and change makers in over 50 projects supporting our core areas of education, marine conservation, and the arts. Our help goes beyond monetary support. We facilitate strategic collaboration opportunities between our NGO partners, their beneficiaries, our different operating companies and our people. Positive change can only be long-lasting when everyone takes part, and when each individual is empowered to contribute and give back to their own communities.
Reflecting the vision of a collective strategy in SwireTHRIVE, we launched TrustTomorrow activities to create more opportunities to connect our people across the Group with the meaningful programmes and community partners we support. On top of the contributions of volunteer teams at our individual businesses, we organised a total of 58 group level activities, contributing an additional 2,385 hours. In the year ahead, we look forward to creating more synergy by connecting stakeholders from within and outside of our group.