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| History of CSR |
All participants of the society expect business to
be carried out in an ethical and socially responsible way. Today, many companies are
recognizing the need to balance environmental, social, and governmental
issues. And, even most of them have begun to implement practices in their
day to day operations, demonstrating how Corporate Social
Responsibility (CSR) should be a fundamental value. Stay
here and know more about this important topic through a brief journey into the
history of CSR for you
to see how it has evolved and changed according to the
societies’ needs.
Everything started in 1960, the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development convention was created to promote policies with the
intention to achieve sustainable economic growth and
employment. Fifteen years later the "Impact and Benefit Agreements"
between Canadian Aboriginal groups and extractive sector companies started. The
aim was to create commitments by the company for employment,
and training about projects constructed near Aboriginal communities.
The years continue to pass, and humanity started to
need more, of course; five years later, in 1980, the International
Union for Conservation of Nature created The World
Conservation Strategy, which was and important move that had the aim of
identifying the main responsible actors of
habitat destruction such as:
- poverty,
- population pressure,
- social inequity, and
- the terms of trade.
After that, the UN Earth Summit was
held in Brazil, where a new business model, as well as the idea of
using sustainable development to a company's competitive advantage was applied.
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| Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development |
In 1993, the launch of the Whitehorse Mining
Initiative took these initiatives to the signing of the WMI
Leadership Council Accord in 1994 in order to achieve a sustainable
mining industry within the framework of an evolving and sustainable
Canadian society. Five years later, Canada, along with Natural
Resources Canada, IDRC, and the leadership of IISD, organized a
workshop in Peru. The event brought together 11 countries from Latin
America and Canada in order to work towards a sustainable future in
the region.
