The origins of the Global Compact

«The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, first proposed the idea of the Global Compact on 31 January 1999 in his appeal to the World Economic Forum. The operational stage of the Global Compact project was launched the following year on 26 July 2000 in New York at the United Nations headquarters.
The Secretary-General invited the leaders of the world economy to join the Global Compact: an international initiative to support nine universal principles on human rights, work and the environment, which would bring together companies, United Nations agencies, trade unions and the population as a whole. Since June 2004 a tenth principle has been added, that of fighting corruption.
The ten principles of the Global Compact derive from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the ILO Declaration, the Rio Declaration and the United Nations Convention against Corruption.

Aims
 
Based on the power of strong collective action, the Global Compact seeks to encourage responsible corporate citizenship to ensure that the business world can contribute to finding solutions to the challenges of globalisation.  In this way, the private sector - in partnership with other corporate players – can contribute to the realisation of the Secretary-General’s aim: a more incisive and sustainable global economy.
The Global Compact is a voluntary corporate citizenship initiative which pursues two complementary objectives:
• To make the Global Compact and its principles become an integral part of the strategy and operations of businesses.
• To facilitate cooperation among the main players and promote partnerships in line with the objectives of the United Nations»
(taken from the Global Compact Italia website: www.globalcompactnetwork.org )

Acea’s involvement

Acea joined the Global Compact in April 2007, with a Letter from the Chairman addressed to the Secretary General of the United Nations. This choice aimed to highlight the coherence between the principles set out in the value codes adopted by the company, aimed at providing it with an ethical compass, and the principles promoted by the United Nations.
Since then, Acea’s commitment was renewed for the first time in 2009 and confirmed in subsequent years.
From 2010 onwards, the Communication on Progress has been incorporated in Acea's Sustainability Report.

For greater details see www.unglobalcompact.org and www.globalcompactnetwork.org