Carlson Wagonlit Travel (CWT), the global digital travel management company, published its latest Annual Responsible Business Report, showing significant progress towards its 2020 objectives. This latest report has reached the UN Global Compact Advanced Level, recognizing the success of CWT’s Corporate Social Responsibility programme.
Demonstrating CWT’s commitment to think, act, and live with integrity, the Annual Responsible Business Report covers CWT’s main achievements in its seven Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) areas, including Human Rights.
“These results show that we are on track to achieve our 2020 Responsible Business ambitions, and demonstrate why this new Annual Responsible Business Report meets the UN Global Compact Advanced Level,” said Françoise Grumberg, CWT’s Vice President, Global Responsible Business. “I am proud of the commitment and passion of our people.”.
Carlson’s support for ECPAT and The Code
Carlson has supported ECPAT for 14 years and was the first North American travel and hospitality company to sign The Code of Conduct for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation in Travel and Tourism (“The Code”).
Carlson contributed to ECPAT’s Global Study on Sexual Exploitation of Children in Travel and Tourism and provided foundation funding of its sector-wide training on these issues. In 2017, Carlson and CWT teams took the Walk The World Together challenge in support of ECPAT International.
Some key accomplishments in 2017 regarding the fight to human trafficking:
- CWT stepped up its fight against human trafficking through reinforced policies, increased awareness and education, and closer collaboration with stakeholders and public leadership. The company launched the ‘Walk The World Together’ global challenge for all employees to support ECPAT International. This campaign to collectively walk 24,901 miles (the circumference of the Earth) increased awareness and financial support to tackle human trafficking.
- CWT participated in the 3,000-mile ‘Race Across America’ in support of ECPAT International to raise awareness and funds to fight human trafficking.
- CWT carried out a detailed review of its Code of Business Ethics and Conduct to reflect the latest industry best practices and legislative trends. It also continued to run mandatory training on the Code of Business Ethics and Conduct for new recruits and current staff, and achieved a 99% completion rate.
- CWT’s community involvement strategy focuses on targeting the 3E’s of: Education, Emergencies, and Essential needs. Through the hard work of its people, CWT organized more than 100 3E initiatives in 2017 alone, partnering with 79 charities around the world.
Supporting ECPAT and The Code is only one of the ways CWT takes a stand to protect human rights. In response to the UK Modern Slavery Act (2015), CWT published a global statement on Anti-Slavery and human trafficking in 2017, which states:
- “we oppose all forms of slavery and human trafficking – without exception;
- we are committed to taking steps to influence our business partners and supply chains;
- we actively support the Ten Principles of the UNGC focusing on the core areas of Human Rights, labor, the environment and anti-corruption as well as the International Labor Organization’s Fundamental Labor standards; and
- we will report annually on progress against these principles.”.
Actions to fight human trafficking
Here are some of the other activities CWT undertook during the year in the fight to end human trafficking and modern slavery:
- Offered a Businesses Ending Slavery and Trafficking (BEST) Employers Alliance training to help employees better understand the issue, recognize the signs of human trafficking and sexual exploitation, and know what they can do to address it.
- Created continuous awareness through a dedicated page on human trafficking and modern-day slavery on their social intranet and held a conference with ECPAT in their Paris and London offices.
- Legal and Compliance team began a new partnership with TrustLaw – an organization that provides pro bono legal advice to not-for-profit organizations that fight modern slavery and human trafficking, among other things, around the world.
About Carlson Wagonlit Travel
Companies and governments rely on us to keep their people connected. We provide their travellers with a consumer-grade travel experience, combining innovative technology with our vast experience. Every day, we look after enough travellers to fill more than 260 Boeing 787s and 100,000 hotel rooms – and handle 105 events. We operate in around 150 countries, and in 2017 posted a total transaction volume of more than US$ 23 billion.
Source: bit.ly/Carlson_CSRreport
