Stakeholder Engagement
Heinz recognizes the value of maintaining an active dialogue with our stakeholders, including employees, consumers, customers, shareholders, non-government organizations and non-profit partners, so we can understand their views on business and corporate social responsibility. To learn more about their corporate social responsibility interests, we conducted a stakeholder survey in the Spring of 2009. Sixty-nine percent of respondents said they read all or most of our 2007 Corporate Social Responsibility report, and 80% indicated that Heinz’s corporate social responsibility efforts were “very” or “extremely” important. This feedback confirmed our beliefs that our stakeholders place tremendous value on our corporate social responsibility efforts.
The stakeholder survey also revealed that the vast majority of respondents were “very” or “extremely” familiar with Heinz’s four main corporate social responsibility initiatives, including HeinzSeed, the Heinz Micronutrient Campaign, the H.J. Heinz Company Foundation and the Heinz Sustainability Goals, which we announced in May 2008.
When asked which sustainability topics they would like to read more about, participants ranked Heinz’s economic benefit to local communities and corporate governance policies and procedures as the two highest economic topics; health and nutrition and malnutrition/poverty work as the two highest social topics; and sustainability goal progress and project case studies as the two highest environmental topics.
Based on the feedback we received from the stakeholder survey, this online 2009 Corporate Social Responsibility Report is designed to engage and inform stakeholders with an improved multimedia report that offers photos and videos, the functionality to create a customized PDF document, in-depth case studies, informative data tables and charts, and interviews with the people driving sustainability at Heinz.
In addition to conducting a survey, we reviewed numerous letters and e-mails from stakeholders regarding our 2007 Corporate Social Responsibility Report and sustainability issues at Heinz. In the interest of objectivity and improvement, we also considered third-party analysis and critical views of our previous reports. If you wish to share your feedback about this year’s report, please e-mail us at CSR@Heinz.com. We look forward to hearing from you.