SHELL SAYS COMMITTED TO SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Date: 21-May-99
Country: UK
Chairman Mark Moody-Stuart said despite "harsh financial pressures" the group remained "totally committed to a business strategy that generates profits while contributing to the well being of the planet and its people. We see no alternative".
Announcing the launch of the second annual Shell report - People, planet & profits; an act of commitment - Moody-Stuart said the group had to take into account economic, environmental and social considerations in everything it did.
"Sustainable development builds the platform on which business thrives and society prospers," he added.
Last year, the group committed itself to an annual update on how it had performed on a variety of social and environmental issues in a bid to generate greater openness and accountability.
"I am pleased to report significant progress in all of those areas," Moody-Stuart told a news conference.
On the environmental side, the second report said that Shell had already met the targets under the Kyoto protocol by reducing greenhouse gas emissions by five percent on 1990 levels, and was on target to cut them by a further five percent by 2002.
The group is committed to end gas disposals from gas flaring at all its operations by 2008.
The report also shows that three employees were sacked in 1998 for bribery, with three more cases pending. The group also cancelled at least 69 contracts for failures to comply with its ethical or health, safety and environment standards.
"This is another step on a long journey," said Moody-Stuart of the second report overall.
Last year's report was a response by Shell to criticism over the group's insularity and the part it played in the disposal of the Brent Spar platform and the troubles in Nigeria in 1995.
"Those events catalysed our ways of thinking. We had to find out what was going wrong," said Moody-Stuart.
He would not comment on progress made with the cost-cutting programme ahead of the group's first quarter results on May 6.
