Kraft Foods Philippines wins in Global CSR Awards

For more than just making a "delicious difference", Kraft Foods Philippines (KFP) won Gold at the 4th Global CSR Awards last April 19 for its "Go Green" Program which continues to save water and energy and reduce carbon emissions for the environment.

Aside from "Making Today Delicious", Kraft Foods, with its multi-awarded sustainability program "Go Green" aims to preserve the environment by reducing KFP's use of water and energy and by lessening its carbon emissions. Kraft Foods has recently upgraded their Water Recycling Facility last March 2012 in their Sucat, Parañaque Manufacturing Plant, which utilizes reverse osmosis and ultraviolet light to treat water that KFP uses in their production activities.

The Global CRS Awards is Asia's most prestigious recognition awards program for corporate social responsibility (CSR). Organized by the Pinnacle Group International based in Singapore, the Global CSR Awards recognizes companies for outstanding programs demonstrating ongoing commitment to respect for individuals, communities and the environment in the way they do business.

Kraft Foods has bagged its 5th Award for its "Go Green"  program in two years.

One of the endeavours of Kraft Foods is to "make every drop reusable" with its wastewater recycling program, involving specific processes producing the high quality standards KFP needs for its manufacturing activities. As a result, Kraft Foods uses treated water instead of fresh water to preserve our natural resources.

“I am personally very pleased to share that with this improvement initiative, Kraft Foods will be able to make a significant reduction to its water consumption,” says Sudip Mall, Kraft Foods Philippines’ General Manager. The amount of water that Kraft Foods hopes to reduce with this new facility is equivalent to filling up 4 Olympic-sized swimming pools or 581,000 5-gallon containers of water!

“Our programs like ‘Go Green,’ don’t just make sense for our business. We also work to protect resources for future generations. I would like to add that it is truly remarkable the way our employees have relentlessly focused on driving our environmental initiatives, of which this facility is an example. We are very proud of the award bestowed upon us and this new phase of our program for the planet’s betterment," he adds.

Aside from the biomass boilers KFP will use in the future, which reduce carbon emissions and utilize alternative energy sources, the ultimate goal of Kraft Foods' "Go Green" program is that by 2013, it will have reduced its water, energy, and carbon dioxide emission and waste generation by 5% year-on-year. It also continues to reduce, reuse and recycle through their Water Management, Ozone Protection, Energy Conservation and Waste Management and Reducing Packaging Use.

PIXAR @25: WALL-E "The Secret of Pandora's Box"

It's not apocalypse. It's not the Great Flood. It's not a Nostradamus prediction. It's hope--hidden under all these.

We take a good look at our candy wrappers now, only to foresee these will be part of a colossal Smokey Mountain we've never imagined before: the world. And it can only be as horrible and inevitable as we choose it to be, whether we're aware of it or not.

Pixar's vision, along with every scientist's wonder, also produced a rough sketch of the world scores after, with its innovative release of WALL-E (2008, directed by Andrew Stanton). And it's not based on any written scriptures or wild predictions all telling us we couldn't possibly do anything about it. The movie was based on man's timeless weakness: discipline.

Laid on the metal claws of a charming mute robot named WALL-E (short for Waste Allocation Lift Loader, Earth-Class) while the human race searched for its new haven in a humongous space ship far out in the Milky Way, the earthly waste land was peacefully decomposing in methane and carbon monoxide. But not until hardworking WALL-E (Ben Burtt) digged out another color people had long forgotten, and proof of the world's hopeful existence: a green sprout.

The movie, I realized was far more optimistic on several levels. It was not only about the green sprout and the captain's enthusiasm to go back to earth. Even its unique idea that the planet was destroyed by unbelievable tons of human waste still reflects on a promising hope as it rooted from human discipline, a part of our nature that can still be changed.

WALL-E's attitude of being obsessively organized in "cubing" and collecting and arranging things always reminds me of how I used to do the same thing, then getting all upset when my siblings would mess it all up. It must also be a revolutionary break-through with Pixar's portrayal of technology evolution with all the electronic and path-finding chairs and hologram computers, the new "oxygen tanks" of the human race back then.

Hope is not hiding from us, nor is it hiding from the brokenhearted world. We simply have to choose to see and believe in it.

WALL-E Fact Sheet

1. "In the world of animation, pantomime is the thing that animators love best. It's their bread and butter." Although absence of dialogue became one of the challenges for Pixar animators in WALL-E, director Andrew Stanton considered it an exciting one.

2. The man behind WALL-E's voice, multiple Oscar-winning sound designer Ben Burtt, also made R2-D2's voice a timeless wonder.

2. The big innocent bulgy eyes of WALL-E were coined from its likeness with binoculars, according to John Lasseter (creator of Toy Story movies).

Our own Alter Space: the world with no future WALL-E

"Switch off the lights, or else..."

Over and over again.

Words we kids never want to hear, and simple duties we always forget to finish. Maybe because it's our parents, and we seriously don't want to hear it from an imperative tongue. But what if it's a game?

I was about to leave my room and paused at the light switch, remembering how I advanced to level two in my Alter Space game because of successfully conserving energy. I'd once thought it's just another amusing game in Facebook, not quite realizing how it changed me. I switched off the light.

Alter Space is the first Filipino environmental awareness game on Facebook. It's designed by Cleanergy from AboitizPower, and through this online recreation, millions of Filipino kids can finally get "addicted" to saving the environment.

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Keep your carbon footprint at a low level and accomplish the tasks at hand. Suddenly all these boring chores became exciting quest logs for us to get to the next level. Switching off the lights, helping friends conserve energy and collecting solar power became part of our online pastime we'd never thought to be this educational and inspirational.

This is the first time I ever played a game in Facebook, realizing I could actually enjoy conserving energy back home. Alter Space would always remind me to turn off the TV and the component when nobody's using them anymore. But what I admire most is the game's promotion of the Filipino culture, highlighting the use of banig when sleeping and the turo-turo store with its Filipino cuisines.

Looking back, WALL-E's filthy world always reminds me how hopeless ours can be. The Smokey Mountain waste land I saw on TV always spoils my optimism that this world can still survive human negligence and cruelty. But then I realize it's not what I see that can save the environment--it's what I think.

Out here in the real world, it's not a game anymore. Playing Alter Space made me realize that we can always perfect our own virtual planets, but we can perfect this planet we live in only once. The change and the decision will always start in me, not in anybody. If I can't convince myself of the hopeful thought of the world's survival, how can I ever convince anybody?

"Be the change you want to see in this world." As part of the hopeful youth, I'll start the campaign in me to change people from all walks of life, just like how Alter Space has changed me.