Following cases are about how chambers can work and support businesses in their endeavours to help them address their social responsibility actions towards community, environment, workplace and marketplace activities.
Since its establishment in 1952, The Asharqia Chamber has conducted several CSR initiatives in the Eastern Province, Saudi Arabia. The most prominent are:
- Patients Friends Committee – It is a committee that was formed to assist the needy patients with healthcare facilities and services.
- Events Funding Program – The program was set up to encourage and conduct the gathering of people in order to promote social interaction and sense of community.
- Dr. Ghazi Al Gosaibi Award for the Best Promising SMEs – This award program is created to celebrate SME owners who have excelled in their business sector by delivering top quality products or services. It serves as a motivation for other SME owners to excel and contribute further to the economy and, also, encourages entrepreneurship.
- Asharqia Chamber Employment Center – The Center was formed to help facilitate the recruitment process for employers in the Eastern Province.
- Burnaby Board of Trade – Pledge for a Sustainable Community
First launched in 2012, the Burnaby Board of Trade’s Pledge for a Sustainable Community program, is a comprehensive online resource with the goal of helping businesses large and small reduce their environmental footprint while at the same time promoting their company and potentially saving money. Program participants have access to an abundance of valuable resources, tips and case studies to help them create a more sustainable workplace. They have the opportunity to share their successes, serve as role models, and pledge to take on new challenges. Once registered as a Pledge member, among other incentives businesses are featured and recognized on Burnaby Board of Trade (BBOT) channels, at events, and in the membership directory. The Pledge is a significant part of the BBOT brand and an important tool for the local business community.
- Finland Chamber of Commerce – Women Leaders Program
Promoting women business leaders through self-regulation is a strategic target of the Finland Chamber of Commerce and we have created our Women Leaders Program to reach that goal. The program has different elements: studies, mentoring program, website, articles, statements and contacts with companies. As a result, we have more women business leaders and data on women leaders, extensive media attention and positive public image.
- Cámara de Industria, Comercio, Servicios y Turismo de Santa Cruz (CAINCO) – FUNDARE
In the last decade, CAINCO promoted a series of Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives, including some “hands on” actions, among others in the social and environmental fields through the creation and support of the Recycling foundation, FUNDARE (Fundación para el Reciclaje Santa Cruz). In this project, CAINCO has supported the creation of an e-waste management plant to be run by FUNDARE, with all the technical, legal and environmental requirements to properly to collect, recover, select, disassemble and re-sell or export semi processed e-waste and electronic parts. This initiative is also aiming to alert/inform the community about e-waste and help a group of trash collectors to be included into the economy.
- Auckland Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry – CadetMax
CadetMax is a solution-based programme developed by the Auckland Chamber to respond to youth unemployment and to build a future workforce. The programme is a partnership between local government, central government, employers, a community and the Chamber and provides career opportunities for at-risk youths. Since 2008, CadetMax has worked with more than 600 young people, providing essential life skills, mentoring and career counseling on the journey to education and employment, resulting in major changes in every aspect of the health and wellbeing of young people, their family and the community.
- Bogota Chamber of Commerce – Hermes
Hermes, a programme to manage school conflicts, began on January 2001 as an initiative of the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce. The programme works under the pretext that the value of the educational processes to transform beliefs and cultural paths must be impressed in children early on.
- Chilean Chamber of Construction – Prisoner training and social/work re-entry
The project promotes prisoner work and social re-entry through job training and the acquisition of proper working habits and values. The programme has a significant economic impact on the beneficiaries and their families and the results show that to date approximately 65% of all participants in the programme continue working in the companies where they did their work experience.
- Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry – Best CSR project
The Dubai Chamber has various CSR initiatives – from green building to the University of Dubai, the Centre for Responsible Business and the Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Business Award – which it groups as part of its CSR project. Each one plays an important role, helping the Dubai Chamber to improve its own sustainability and its contribution to its stakeholders, strengthening job skills and entrepreneurship among the community, as well as improving and celebrating the responsibility of its members.
- Istanbul Chamber of Commerce – Ozimek
The main objectives of the project are the preservation, development and increase of employment by enabling individuals to benefit from vocational and technical education institutions.
- Chamber of Commerce and Industry Lippe-Detmold – “Partners in Responsibility for Lippe”
Local businesses within the chamber’s district are faced with a declining population. This means less workforce and skilled labour, less consumers and in the long run less competitiveness of the region. The chamber started a network of some 70 companies and institutions to increase the attractiveness of the region for young families, to enhance professional training, to improve the employability of the elder workforce and to strengthen the integration of citizens with migratory background into business and society.
- Greater Kitchener Waterloo Chamber of Commerce – Physicians Recruitment
Family physician recruitment is critical to meeting the primary health care needs of our rapidly growing population. This is a community health care issue and an economic development imperative. The Physician Recruitment initiative has been an avid focus for the Greater Kitchener Waterloo Chamber of Commerce for sixteen years. The project originated in 1998 when a core group of local professionals and volunteers identified a significant shortage of family doctors in our community. This shortfall in doctors resulted in over 40,000 residents in Kitchener, Waterloo, and Woolwich Township as not having a family doctor. In 1998 the population of these cities was only slightly higher than 300,000, which meant 1 in 7 residents were lacking a family doctor and impacting our community’s ability to grow and prosper.
- Estonian Chamber of Commerce and Industry – Realize Your Dreams!
Unistused Ellu! (Realize Your Dreams!) Network brings together socially responsible companies and organizations, with the aim of designing and giving value to the enterprising attitudes in the society and facilitating the implementation of entrepreneurship studies in the educational system.
- Al-Ahsa Chamber of Commerce and Industry – Pre-marital Medical Test Project
Our goal with the “Pre-marital Medical Test Project” examination decision was establishing the first specialized Center for Blood Genetic Diseases in the Kingdom. We challenged norms and traditions and bear the responsibility of delivering a clear message for all that we did not deny our cultural and civil heritage, but we wanted a better life and future for our children away from suffer and pain.
- Junior Chamber International (JCI) Petaling Jaya – Creative Young Entrepreneur Award (CYEA)
The JCI Creative Young Entrepreneur Award (JCI CYEA) is a unique project that involved all the sector of societies from government, business and civil society; fully utilizing their unique resources, expertise, knowledge, experience and power to promote adherence of the principles of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and to cultivate social responsibility to the community. In 2014, one of the winners from 2013 initiated a project that gathers entrepreneurs to engage in CSR activities and speak about CSR to the youth in the community.