Carphone Warehouse 2009 Annual Report Download - page 30

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26 The Carphone Warehouse Group PLC Annual Report 2009
Directors’ Report – Business Review
Corporate Responsibility – continued
Community projects
We regularly organise overseas
challenges in which a group of
employees tackle an infrastructure
project in developing countries. This
work cuts across all of our key corporate
responsibility areas, combining charity
fundraising, practical community work
and employee engagement. This year,
33 employees travelled to Morocco to
build a bridge for a remote Berber tribe
to prevent them being cut off from the
larger cities during oods, and raised
over £30,000 for our charity partners
in the process.
Mobile phones and health
In 2007, the UK Mobile
Telecommunications and Health
Research (MTHR) programme published
a detailed report to provide an update
on the research work it has been
undertaking since its inception in 2001.
The work has been funded jointly by
Government and Industry, and is run by
an independent programme management
committee to ensure that none of the
contributors can inuence the outcome
of the programme. The Carphone
Warehouse has been a signicant
contributor to research in this area.
None of the research supported by
the programme and published so far
demonstrates that biological or adverse
health effects are produced by
radiofrequency exposure from mobile
phones. Specically, no association was
found between short-term mobile phone
use (less than 10 years) and cancers of
the brain and nervous system. Similarly,
studies on electrical hypersensitivity
have not supported the theory that
symptoms experienced by sufferers
result from exposure to signals from
mobile phones and base stations.
The report proposed a further
programme of work to address areas
of outstanding concern, which it will
report on in due course. These include
whether longer-term mobile phone usage
increases the risk of developing cancers
of the brain and nervous system,
and whether any effects of exposure
to mobile phone signals are greater
in children.
The Carphone Warehouse continues to
take a lead in communicating health
issues to customers, with leaets in
stores and the specic absorption rates
for every handset we sell listed in our
buyers’ guide and on our website.
Environmental impact
The Group’s businesses are not, by their
nature, particularly high impact in terms
of carbon emissions and waste, but that
is not to say that we are not committed
to reducing our impact. This year we
have begun to take some of the many
small steps needed to do business
differently and make a contribution to
environmental sustainability. Almost all
of our projects have a real nancial
benet to the business as well as an
environmental benet, so they make
sense on every level.
Carbon footprint
The carbon footprint for our UK
businesses is 46,000 tonnes. Our goal
is to reduce this by 12% by 2012. This
year we are calculating our non-UK
carbon footprint and will publish
combined totals and targets in the
next annual report.
Mobile phone recycling
With customers typically replacing their
mobile phones every two years, there
is a huge number of old phones to be
processed. We have been recycling
mobile phones for many years, either
shipping them for refurbishment and use
in developing markets, or breaking them
down into their constituent parts for the
materials to be used in other products.
This year we recycled over 130,000
handsets, an increase of nearly 30%
on last year. For every handset we
receive around £10, so this has been
a major contributor to our charity funds
over the last few years.
In addition, we are compliant with the
Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment
(“WEEE”) Regulations which came into
force in 2007. These regulations require
us to nance the collection, treatment and
recovery of waste electrical equipment,
and to allow customers to return their
waste equipment free of charge.
Information on the correct disposal of
WEEE is provided to customers with
relevant products and in stores.
Environmental initiatives
New environmental initiatives over the
last year include:
▪
Journey Share: after introducing the
scheme in December 2007, we now
have over 500 members sharing lifts
to work;