Business shortcomings on anti-corruption measures remain-UN study

Published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer

July 9, 2007

A United Nations survey said Monday that there were still major shortcomings in business's approach to human rights and anti-corruption measures despite progress in adopting socially and environmentally responsible standards.

The first report on the corporate response to the UN's seven-year-old partnership with companies, the Global Compact, said there was "much room for advancement" on corporate assessments of their impact on human rights, reporting cases of corruption, and in overseeing their suppliers' compliance.

"The survey shows there are distinct areas where companies are excelling and others where they lag," it added.

The human rights group Amnesty International said the voluntary arrangement had not been effective so far and voiced frustration at the lack of enforcement of the 10 pledges dealing with human rights, labour, the environment and anti-corruption.

The report was released ahead of the biggest meeting yet on the UN's Global Compact in Geneva on Thursday and Friday.

It is due to bring together about 650 business executives, as well as ministers, campaign groups, and international organisations.

The 60 page survey of about 400 companies marks the first time the United Nations has tried to assess the implementation of its 10 principles by the Compact's near 4,000 strong corporate members.

The public benchmarking will now be annual, Global Compact Executive Director Georg Kell said.

Eighty-nine percent of companies said they gave employees greater say in policies on labour standards, more than 80 percent said they had measures against discrimination, while 69 percent allowed trade unions.

Half said they had set up policies against forced or child labour, while just 38 percent monitored labour standards in their supply chain.

Forty-three percent of the companies said they had environmental performance targets, but only a quarter to 29 percent had targets for sustainable consumption or production.

Sixty-one percent of companies claimed a "zero tolerance" policy towards corruption, but only seven percent said they publicised political donations and just 23 percent set sanctions for policy breaches.

Companies were largely monitoring human rights in the workplace. Only 31 percent conducted assessments on the broader risk their policies might pose for human rights, while just 16 percent examined their actual impact.

Kell told journalists companies had initially joined the Global Compact thinking they could use it to enhance their public relations.

"That has fundamentally changed, there has been a significant shift towards quality," he argued, underlining the increasing business risk involved in transgressions, and the growing implication of top level management in overseeing proper standards.

"We delisted 600 participants last year and we expect another 500 to be delisted this year," he added, citing shortcomings in their reporting.

However, the number of companies joining the Compact is growing by about one-third a year.

Amnesty International criticised the voluntary nature of the Compact, underlining that it did not replace a company's legal responsibility.

"I would say that we are very concerned that it isn't being very effective," Audrey Gaughran of Amnesty told AFP. "There is no analysis of the substance."

At least one of the companies with participants registered for the Geneva meeting, electric engineering giant Siemens, is embroiled in corruption investigations in Germany, including on suspicion of setting up a slush-fund to obtain foreign contracts.

"Siemens is now prepared to totally reconsider its engagement in the Global Compact and to take it far more seriously," Kell commented.

Are there 88 Million Filipinos?

National Census will confirm soon
culled from the Business Mirror/June 22

THE much-delayed Census of Population is ready for implementation in August and would confirm earlier estimates that Filipinos now number about 88 million, the National Statistics Office (NSO) said on Thursday.

The P1.3-billion survey should also help the government determine how fast or how slow the Philippine population is growing, and from there formulate possible population-related policies, NSO Administrator Carmelita N. Ericta noted in an agency statement.

Its scheduled conduct last year was shelved after NSO failed to obtain the financial cover for it. NSO’s population census in 2000 put the country’s population at 76.5 million, and this year’s edition aims to confirm if the government’s assumption of a 1.95-percent population growth within 2005 to 2010 has been achieved. Also included in the Popcen questionnaire are questions on the occupation, economic activities, disability and ethnic grouping of the respondents.

Up to 50,000 census takers and NSO field staff will visit homes to solicit specific information on the household number, and the ages, sex, marital status, education, among others, of the members. Each interview takes about 15 to 30 minutes to finish.

Ericta further explained that new information gathered from the survey was important since this gives a more concrete reference for social and economic development plans and program.

Earlier government numbers indicated a 2.36-percent population growth during the years 1995 to 2000, which slowed down to 2.05 percent during the period 2000 to 2005. A 2.36-percent growth result for the August survey means the Philippine population will double in 29 years while a 1.95-percent growth means it would take 35 years.

Among its other uses, the NSO chief noted, includes being the basis for internal revenue allotment for local government units, the determination of congressional seats, the creation of new municipalities or provinces or their upgrades into higher levels.

“Businesses and industries [also] use the statistical information from the census in determining sites for establishing businesses, consumer demands for various goods and services and supply of labor for the production of goods and services,” Ericta noted in the statement.

Ingenious savings plan for urban poor in QC

By Margaux Ortiz
Inquirer
Last updated 05:26am (Mla time) 06/11/2007

MANILA, Philippines -- The Quezon City government has come up with an ingenious savings scheme to enable urban poor beneficiaries of the city’s socialized housing program in Project 4 to pay their monthly amortizations.

Under the “Impok-Pabahay” scheme, the 160 beneficiaries of the Escopa Resettlement Project will be provided with “alkansyang bahay” (homebanks) to encourage them to pay their housing obligations through a planned savings program.

Quezon City Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr. said each beneficiary would be urged to set aside P57 daily for the alkansyang bahay to pay the monthly amortizations ranging from P1,200 to P1,900.

“Each specially-designed homebank will be opened only during a designated collection date with the key entrusted to the homeowners’ president,” Belmonte said, explaining that the city has entered into a partnership with the National Housing Authority (NHA) for the implementation of the program. Belmonte added, “The program is aimed at instilling the Filipino value of ‘pag-iimpok’ (saving for the rainy days) among beneficiaries.”

Continue reading the rest of the article here.

GO, Left in cahoots to ruin economy -- TU

An "unholy alliance"? hmnnn... that's new. Read on...

By Cynthia Balana, Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines -- Team Unity on Wednesday accused the Genuine Opposition and a leftist group of forging an “unholy alliance” to wreck the country’s economic takeoff with their charges of electoral fraud against pro-administration senatorial candidates.

Eastern Samar Gov. Ben Evardone, TU chief of the media bureau and campaign strategist, said the GO-affiliated Liberal Party faction of Sen. Franklin Drilon and left-wing party-list groups led by Bayan Muna had been launching media offensives to discredit the May 14 electoral process.

Insidious objective

“While the LP wants to void the Maguindanao elections, Bayan Muna and other left-wing party-list groups allied with GO have been blaming the Armed Forces for their failure to dominate the party-list polls,” Evardone said. “These groups have one and the same insidious objective, which is to paint the elections as dishonest and fraud-marred. They are merely using the claimed vote-monitoring work to cover up their real intent, which is to destabilize the government in the guise of protesting alleged poll cheating,” he added.

‘Retail cheating’

According to Evardone, the two groups claim there has been “retail cheating” in favor of TU bets just to make people doubt the results of the elections.He said the alliance was also stepping up its efforts to destabilize the administration following the overwhelming victory of most pro-administration candidates in the congressional and local races.

Read the rest of the article here.

Inside PCIJ...

Here's an article culled from the PCIJ blog, which is by the way, winner of the 2007 Philippine Blog Awards for BEST NEWS and MEDIA BLOG...

Candidates challenged to support Reproductive Health Rights

BARELY a month left in the campaign, reproductive health issues have yet to figure prominently in the platforms of candidates running for public office in the coming May elections.

Population watchdogs attribute this apparent reluctance among candidates to include population and family planning in their platforms to their fear of losing in the elections if they antagonize certain influential sectors like the Catholic Church, which has time and again opposed alternative family planning methods other than the natural one.

But the Philippine Legislators’ Committee on Population and Development Foundation (PLCPD) said such indecision is baseless, citing the recent Pulse Asia Ulat ng Bayan Survey showing nearly eight out of 10 or 76 percent of Filipinos placing considerable importance on family planning as an election issue.

The March 2007 survey also revealed that one in every two Filipinos (52 percent) actually think that candidates who will support family planning will help them win in the elections. Forty-four percent of respondents likewise think that the Church must not involve itself in the issue compared to 33 percent who say otherwise.

Pulse Asia further reported that most Filipinos (92 percent) believe that planning is important in one’s family and nine out of 10 Filipinos think that the government must finance modern methods of family planning, including the use of pills, condoms, and uterine devices, ligation and vasectomy.

PLCPD and other reproductive-health advocacy NGOs, which gathered together in a forum the other day in Manila, a city known for its controversial policies against artificial birth control methods (see the PCIJ story, In Manila, Pills and Condoms Go Underground), are therefore challenging candidates to support family planning and reproductive health issues by including these in their platforms.

The country’s current population is pegged at 83.7 million, with an annual growth rate of 2.36, the highest in Asia. (Read PLCPD’s “Population and Reproductive Health, What Every Candidate Must Know“)

In 2004, the Philippines was ranked as the 12th most populated country in the world by the Washington-based Population Reference Bureau. The group said Philippines is expected to remain in the 12th until 2050. Metro Manila alone was reported to be among the world’s most populous urban agglomerations.

Continue reading here.

Ma. Roma Marqueses of St. Scholastica’s College is currently doing her internship with the PCIJ.