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About BEN
Our mission is to help transform the role of corporations in society by building the capacity of our members in their corporate campaign work, by providing education, facilitating collaboration, and increasing recognition of their campaign successes with the funding community and the public.
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| Campaigns and Victories » Campaigns |
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Campaigns
The mission of the Business Ethics Network (BEN) is in
improving the effectiveness of corporate campaigns worldwide in order to make
business practices more ethical in terms of the environment, health, social
justice, and labor. The majority of the campaign alerts, press releases, and reports gathered here are from BEN member organizations.
BEN celebrates the achievements of all communities working to ensure that their voices are heard. The BENNY and Path to Victory awards are given to outstanding campaigns such as the ones that are showcased here.
Elevated levels of toxins found in Athabasca River
by Josh Wingrove, Globe and Mail
A study set to be published on Monday has found elevated levels of mercury, lead and eleven other toxic elements in the oil sands’ main fresh water source, the Athabasca River, refuting long-standing government and industry claims that water quality there hasn’t been affected by oil sands development.
Walmart's war on labor
BrassCheck
It's Labor Day. Over 100 years ago, workers risked life and limb to get things like a five day work week, an eight hour day, and the right to organize. Walmart, the country's #1 retailer, and one of the biggest corporations in the world, is doing its best to dismantle those gains one by one.
New Study Shows Coal Ash Water Contamination Much Worse Than Previous Estimates
EarthJustice
(c) Jerry D. Greer.Days before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) kicks off a series of regional hearings across the United States on whether and how to regulate toxic coal ash waste from coal-fired power plants, a major new study identifies 39 additional coal-ash dump sites in 21 states that are contaminating drinking water or surface water with arsenic and other heavy metals.
The Dark Side of Family Business
by Phil Mattera, Dirt Diggers Digest
Americans love entrepreneurship, and no form of it is more celebrated than the family business. Most of us distrust big banks and giant corporations, but who doesn’t have warm feelings about mom and pop companies or family farms?
Decoding RBS Greenwash
RAN
As 500 climate activists set up camp at RBS Global Headquarters in Edinburgh last week, the bank tried and failed to play the victim. Despite the bank’s assertions to the press, we showed that the bank is not a top funder of renewable energy (according to Bloomberg), and never offered to meet with protest leaders (according to protest leaders).
The Polaris Institute endorses UK re-think Alberta campaign
Polaris Institute
On the heels of its endorsement of a July ad campaign aimed at branding Alberta as one of the world’s dirtiest energy producing places to visit, the Polaris Institute welcomes Corporate Ethics International’s re-think Alberta campaign encouraging people in the United Kingdom to think twice about visiting Alberta.
'Conflict minerals' finance gang rape in Africa
by Margot Wallström, UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, in Guardian [UK] , BHRRC
What does the financial reform package recently signed into law in the US have to do with preventing mass rape in Africa? Quite a lot, it seems.
Wal-Mart feels the squeeze in US
BBCNews
Wal-Mart's profits rose to $3.6bn (£2.3bn) helped by cost-cutting and growth in international markets.
But Wal-Mart sounded a note of caution, saying the slow economic recovery would "continue to affect" customers.
Pipeline Protestors Greet Obama in Chicago
FOE
Activists who oppose a controversial pipeline that would bring the world’s dirtiest oil to the U.S. demonstrated outside of a fundraising event attended by President Obama here today and called on the president to reject a permit to allow the project to move forward.
India's Poor Seek Wealth in E-Waste
SVTC
"New America Now" sat down with Sunita Sohrabji of India West Newspaper and Sheila Davis, the executive director of the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition for a 2-part discussion on the e-waste issue in India and spotlight the SVTC documentary "Citizens at Risk". Below is part 2, featuring SVTC.
Africans call for urgent mining reforms
LMN
Following a recent African conference, a substantial number of organisations, supported by their overseas colleagues, are calling for “the promotion and protection of community rights, the environment, and realisation of the aspirations of African peoples” impacted by mining.
Obama's policy is a positive step for our seas
by Jackie Dragon, San Francisco Chronicle, Pacific Environment
Some say that the Deepwater Horizon oil-gushing disaster is Obama's Hurricane Katrina. Perhaps in response to that suggestion, President Obama signed an executive order last week to create a first-ever National Ocean Policy.
Ann Wright, Peace Seeker of the Year 2010
PeaceSeekers
The Montana Peace Seekers Network is blessed and deeply privileged to name you, Ann Wright, as
Peace Seeker of the Year 2010, as an expression of the deep respect, appreciation and honor in which you
are held by the peace and justice community of Montana.
Green Scissors Reports
FOE
Since 1994, the Green Scissors Campaign, led by Friends of the Earth, Taxpayers for Common Sense and U.S. Public Interest Research Group, has been working with Congress and the Administration to end environmentally harmful and wasteful spending. Working to breach party lines, the Green Scissors Campaign has helped cut more the $26 billion in environmental wasteful programs from the federal budget.
Russia Joins United States In Conceding It Will Miss CWC Deadline
CWWG
Russia has conceded it will miss by three years a legally binding deadline of 2012 for destroying its massive stockpile of chemical weapons, the top official overseeing compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), an international treaty on chemical weapons destruction, announced late last month.
Push to Regulate E-Waste in Silicon Valley
by Jacob Simas, New America Media - BayCitizen, SVTC
Silicon Valley is the epicenter of computer innovation, but the "e-waste," the debris of Californians' high-tech lifestyle, gets exported to places like India, China and Nigeria, where the electronic scraps sit in open landfills, a source of income for children and adults who sift through the piles of discarded parts in hopes of extracting copper, aluminum and other metals.
$96 for 50 hours of work?
EBASE
You might have read that EBASE and the Coalition for Clean and Safe Ports took our fight to fix the broken port trucking system all the way to Washington, DC this past spring. Thanks to your support, members of Congress turned up the heat on the industry.
Victory! Seattle to Begin Using Sweatfree Uniform Purchasing Policy
SweatFreeCommunities
The new policy requires sweat-free labor standards and a Code of Conduct for all bidders on City uniform contracts and makes a commitment to protections against slave labor, forced labor, forced overtime, excessive hours, child labor, below-poverty wages, discrimination, harassment, and other types of unfair labor practices. The new policy will be integrated into bid and contract materials and used as contracts come up for new bid.
CEI Launches the ReThink Alberta Campaign to stop the Tar Sands
CEI
With the Calgary Stampede underway, billboards asking Americans to rethink their travel plans to Alberta rolled out across four major US cities today (cities that bring the most US tourists annually to Alberta) marking the first wave of a multi-year ad campaign aimed at revealing Alberta to be one of the world’s dirtiest destinations.
CEI Launches the ReThink Alberta Campaign to stop the Tar Sands
With the Calgary Stampede underway, billboards asking Americans to rethink their travel plans to Alberta rolled out across four major US cities today (cities that bring the most US tourists annually to Alberta) marking the first wave of a multi-year ad campaign aimed at revealing Alberta to be one of the world’s dirtiest destinations.
Rein in the Meatpackers
WORC
Today, a tiny handful of meatpackers and poultry processors dominates the livestock industry, making it hard for an individual farmer or rancher to get a fair deal or equitable price for cattle, hogs, or chickens. Packers are able to use their monopoly-like power to manipulate prices paid to livestock producers.
Rethink Alberta
http://rethinkalberta.org/
Does the Gulf Oil Spill make your angry? Wait until you learn about North America’s “other oil disaster.”
The Alberta Tar Sands have been described as “the most destructive energy project on earth.”
Powerful US Congressman Sends Serious Opposition to Canada Oil Sands Pipeline
by Kevin Grandia, desmogblog
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), a senior member of Congress and chair of the powerful Congressional Committee on Energy and Commerce has penned a public letter to the Secretary of State, Hilary Rodham Clinton, in which he states strong opposition to a planned oil pipeline that would transport Canada's controversial tar sands oil to the US Gulf Coast.
Tar Sands Poised to Become the Next Fossil Fuels Disaster
by Sarah Hodgdon, TreeHugger
If we could go back in time before the BP Deepwater Horizon rig exploded on April 20, what would we learn? What steps would have helped avert what is now the nation's worst environmental disaster? Could this hindsight help us prevent similar catastrophes in the future? Would our political leaders have the moral compass to "get it right" this time around?
A Business Backlash?
by Phil Mattera, Dirt Diggerse Digest
By all rights, the laissez-faire crowd should be silent these days. Recent months have been marked by one example after another of the perils of deregulation and the folly of trusting large corporations to do the right thing.
YouTube Prevails, Viacom Sulks, Internet Breathes Easy
TruthDig
A judge Wednesday upheld one of the basic rules of the Internet, saving YouTube one billion dollars and letting the rest of us get on with business as usual. Viacom had accused YouTube of profiting from Viacom copyrighted content, but the judge in the case decided that the Google-owned website acted appropriately.
50 Representatives Urge Obama to Recognize Keystone XL Pipeline’s Threat to Clean Energy Future
dirtyoilsands.org
As details continue to emerge on just how extensively BP cut corners at the expense of safety, and 60,000 barrels of oil gushes into the Gulf each day, nearly two months after the Deepwater Horizon explosion, 50 members of Congress submitted a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press her and the Obama administration not to rush to approve a new tar sands oil pipeline that would stretch over 2,000 miles of the United States from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.
The American Power Act - report card [PDF]
climaterealitycheck.org
One-page report card on the Kerry-Lieberman "American Power Act" (pdf) from CRC: "We are an alliance of groups dedicated to solutions to climate change that withstand the reality check of the best scientific evidence, the precautionary principle, the values of fairness and justice, the polluter pays principle, and the need for U.S. policies to be consistent with robust international responses.
Companies commit to human rights in increasing numbers
BHRRC
As representatives of over 1000 companies gather this week in New York at the United Nations Global Compact Leaders Summit, Realizing Rights and the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre have published a list of over 270 companies worldwide known to have adopted a human rights policy statement
In the Battle to Save Forests,
Activists Target Corporations
by Rhett Butler, e360
Large corporations, not small-scale farmers, are now the major forces behind the destruction of the world’s tropical forests. From the Amazon to Madagascar, activists have been directing their actions at these companies — so far with limited success.
Investigation Shows BP Cut Costs Before Blowout
by Mike Ludwig, TruthOut
House Democrats are asking BP Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward about risky cost-cutting and time-saving measures identified by a Congressional investigation that appear to have increased the risk of a blowout on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
Kentucky Coal Plant Funding Challenged
EarthJustice
Late Tuesday, regional and national organizations challenged a decision by the federal Rural Utilities Service (RUS) to allow the East Kentucky Power Cooperative (EKPC) to waive federal debt obligations and seek private financing for a new 278-MW coal-fired power plant at the J.K Smith Power Station in Clark County, Kentucky.
Energy politics in the Senate: why Merkley’s oil plan matters
by David Roberts, Grist
This morning Sen. Jeff Merkley will introduce "America Over a Barrel: Solving Our Oil Vulnerability" (PDF), a policy plan devoted to reducing oil use, at an event at the Center for American Progress. I think it could make a big difference in the debate.
Animal Waste on Factory Farms Comes Under Closer EPA Scrutiny
ENS
In a legal settlement that could affect the entire U.S. meat industry, the Environmental Protection Agency has agreed to identify and investigate thousands of factory farms that have been avoiding government regulation for water pollution with animal waste.
India convicts 7 in 1984 Bhopal gas disaster
by Mark Magnier and Anshul Rana,, LATIMES
Former executives of U.S. chemical giant Union Carbide's India unit are sentenced to two years. The first criminal convictions in the 26-year-old case are widely condemned as a mockery of justice.
International alliance created to help corporations avoid illegal wood
by Jeremy Hance, mongobay.com
Given the complexities of the global wood trade and the difficulty of deciphering a product's source of wood, the World Resources Institute (WRI), the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA-US and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) have banded together to create a global initiative, the Forest Legality Alliance, to aid private corporations to reduce the trade in illegal wood.
Fishy Conservation Efforts
by Achim Steiner, PolicyInnovations
If you happen to be a salamander known as the Iranian Kaiser spotted newt, chances are that things may be looking up. Governments at the recent meeting in Doha of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) voted for a trade ban on Iranian Kaisers, alongside tougher protection for a host of land-living creatures.
Feds approve new Gulf oil well off La
by R. Baker, APNEws
Federal regulators approved Wednesday the first new Gulf of Mexico oil well since President Barack Obama lifted a brief ban on drilling in shallow water, even while deepwater projects remain frozen after the massive BP spill.
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