So the US government decided to sneak a rider into the Financial Reform Bill in an attempt to address the issue of conflict minerals coming out of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. The goal is to dry up revenue that fuels rebel fighting in the region. As I mentioned in Part I last […]
While many companies are still try to figure out what their CSR strategy is (or in some cases, what CSR is period), lumber and paper giant Weyerhaeuser has recently issued its 2009 Sustainability Report. Weyerhaeuser was an early adopter of the voluntary Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) report. The company started publishing a report of their […]
Mining in DRC There has been a whole lot of chatter in recent days about a little provision tucked into the newly adopted Financial Reform Bill. That provision is the Conflict Minerals mandate, which basically states that companies using “columbite-tantalite (coltan), cassiterite, gold, wolframite or their derivatives” (and others at the discretion of the Secretary […]
Since 1997 the United States government has enforced economic sanctions on Sudan, by keeping American businesses from working with Khartoum and the al-Bashir government. This was due to the fact that Sudan was placed on the list of “state sponsors of terrorism”. Of course, this was a number of years before the genocide in Darfur […]
On the surface Honest Tea and Coca-Cola may seem like strange bedfellows, but ultimately, each company adds value for one another. The question is, does it come at a price? This issue was explored recently in a New York Times Case Study in the Small Business report.
Probably not, but it sure is delicious. All joking aside, college campuses have always been rife with awareness/activism, however the recent trends seems to be direct involvement in projects rather than simple awareness campaigns. Young people are becoming more interested social and environmental issues particularly in far-away places thanks to social media and online images/videos […]
The bigger question… why do tech companies claim that it is virtually impossible to determine if they are sourcing conflict minerals?