Corporate Social Responsibility

An approach by business to embed social and environmental concerns and outcomes in their business model. There is a broad spectrum of interpretations, ranging from greenwash through to ensuring business practices are empathetic to and genuinely value social and environmental outcomes. Some aims of corporate social responsibility might be to improve the reputation of a business, improve profits by having a larger customer base with similar values, create more sustainable local communities that are supported by the business, address wider equitable and ethical concerns, improve the longer term viability of a business, drive and embrace innovation to continually improve, recognise the importance of community within the business model, act as an advocate for more sustainable and sympathetic social and environmental impact work practices, or contribute more philanthropically to society. To reduce unwanted or unwarranted accusations of greenwash having a transparent, auditable system along with open reporting of the findings will provide greater accountability and trust in the actions and words of a business.