Our goal is simple: to achieve world-class safety performance.

The safety of our colleagues is a top priority. Every day, we strive to ensure all of our employees feel safe and comfortable, and are able to work in an accident-free environment. Our goal is to build a safety culture that promotes our goal of ZERO incidents by eliminating risks across four key areas:

1. Occupational health – To safeguard our employees against long term health issues related to work place
2. Personal Safety – To entrench safe working tools, and standards that promote the personal safety of every individual within our company
3. Process Safety – To improve the design, implementation, management and control of any identified hazardous process within our operations
4. Vehicle Safety – To improve driver safety and vehicle related activities in all our functions and operations

We’re reinforcing the safety policy, which outlines our beliefs and commitments to safety:

• All accidents and injuries are unacceptable and we will strive to eliminate all such occurrences.
• Safety and health improvement is an individual and team responsibility.
• Each of us must be dedicated to conducting all activities with the highest concern for employee safety and health.
• Each of us should participate in a local safety program and actively seek to achieve an accident/injury free work environment.

We're committed to:

• Meeting or exceeding all applicable safety and health regulations.
• Continuously improving the safety of our work environment by investing in our people and our facilities.
• Creating and maintaining a world-class safety culture to achieve an accident-free work environment.

And with our Work Play Live Safe program, colleagues across the globe are firmly committed to safe practices, safe environments and safe ways of working. Our safety principles guide our everyday actions:

1. Nothing we do is worth getting hurt.
2. All injuries and occupational illnesses can and must be prevented.
3. Working safely is a condition of employment.

The programs we put in place at our plants meet the Occupational Health and Safety Assessment Series (OHSAS) 18001 Series, one of the only internationally recognized safety management systems. And, we are proud to see improvements in our safety performance every year.

Human Rights

The programs we put in place at our plants meet the Occupational Health and Safety Assessment Series (OHSAS) 18001 Series, one of the only internationally recognized safety management systems. And, we are proud to see improvements in our safety performance every year. View our Code of Conduct and other documents in our Compliance & Integrity section for more information around our approach to human rights.
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Advancing gender equality

In April 2013, we signed the UN Women’s Empowerment Principles to express support for advancing equality between women and men to:

• Bring the broadest pool of talent to our endeavours;
• Further our companies’ competitiveness;
• Meet our corporate responsibility and sustainability commitments;
• Model behaviour within our companies that reflects the society we would like for our employees, fellow citizens and families;
• Encourage economic and social conditions that provide opportunities for women and men, girls and boys;
• Foster sustainable development in the countries in which we operate.

We welcome the provisions of the Women’s Empowerment Principles – Equality Means Business, produced and disseminated by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) and the UN Global Compact. The Principles present seven steps that business and other sectors can take to advance and empower women.

Equal treatment of women and men is not just the right thing to do – it is also good for business. The full participation of women in our enterprises and in the larger community makes sound business sense now and in the future. A broad concept of sustainability and corporate responsibility that embraces women’s empowerment as a key goal will benefit us all. The seven steps of the Women’s Empowerment Principles will help us realize these opportunities.

We will strive to use sex-disaggregated data in our sustainability reporting to communicate our progress to our own stakeholders. We committed to extending our reporting on gender rights in cocoa farming.  Promoting women's empowerment has been a key pillar in our Cocoa Life initiative. We’ve committed to share our experience and to advocate for collaborative action on women’s rights in cocoa. We encourage business leaders to join us and use the Principles as guidance for actions that we can all take in the workplace, marketplace and community to empower women and benefit our companies and societies.
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Workplace Wellness

Healthy colleagues are engaged and productive. So it's no surprise that to grow a successful business you need a healthy workforce. That's why we encourage and support our colleagues in having healthier lifestyles. We offer various health and well-being tools and resources in many of the facilities we have around the world – and our goal is to expand these efforts each year. Though the current tools and resources may differ based on local and cultural needs, they generally offer similar elements around nutritional, physical and mental well-being.

Here are just a few ways we're helping our teams feel better–physically and mentally:

• Lifestyle improvement programs, such as stress management, weight management and smoking cessation
• Fitness and/or sports facilities onsite, incentives for gym membership reimbursement and employee sports competitions
• Health screenings and exams, including vaccinations and flu shots
• Healthier options and nutrition information in our cafeterias and canteens
• Health newsletters/intranet sites that offer health tips and work-life/flex time programs