ESSAY QUESTION Your essay question is: “Can CSR make a significant contribution to addressing the global challenge of waste management If so how? If not, why not? Guidance: As well as an introduction and conclusion, you need to include the following sections in the main body of your essay: Define your terms: What is CSR? What is waste management? Why is waste management a global challenge? How does global business impact waste management (in both negative and positive ways)? Give examples. How can CSR (which you have already defined in section 1) help address waste management? o Refer to CSR concepts and theories, and provide examples of CSR (e.g. of company, sector, CSR initiatives). What are the limitations of CSR approaches to waste management? o Refer to CSR concepts and theories, discuss the examples you have already given and present further examples if you wish. Taking into account both the contributions that CSR can make to addressing waste management (section 3) and the limitations of CSR approaches to waste management (section 4), answer the essay question: Can CSR make a significant contribution to addressing the global challenge of waste management? If so, how? If not, why not? In doing this you will benefit from explaining what you mean by ‘significant contribution’. We require you to use a minimum 6 academic references in Assessment 3. These can be from the course or from beyond the course. The aim of doing research is to inform your essay. Please note that essays awarded a high mark would normally be based on highquality research drawing upon a diverse range of academic resources as well as practitioner and policybased information.
ROYAL MELBOURNE INSTITUTION TECHNOLOGY Semester 2-2022 (2292) BUSM4692_ GLOBAL CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY INDIVIDUAL ESSAY TOPIC: “Can CSR make a significant contribution to addressing the global challenge of waste management?” Lecturer: MR Thanapat Group 04_SGS Types of assignment: Individual Assignment (50%) Due date: 18 September 2022 Word count: 2750 Pages: 10 I INTRODUCTION Business waste and its dealing have been subjects of arguments, connected to the rising social attention on ecological decay and the planet's sustainability (O'Neill and Volkman 2019) The context of waste management is linked to the improvement of theory and examination of CSR, an idea that determines businesses' roles and obligations to their environment and communities' maintainability (Dahlsrud 2008) Waste management (WM) can be put within the investigation of CSR, fundamentally connected with how CSR can help business address the challenge of waste management in general This essay aims to provide an analysis to answer the required questions that whether CSR can make a significant contribution to addressing global challenge of waste management Firstly, this essay will clarify the definition of CSR and waste management to have an overview Second, this paper will discuss the impacts of a global business on waste management which is supported by real business cases Next, there will conduct detailed analyses of some potential contributions of CSR to help address waste management, as well as CSR limitations in WM processes alongside real examples Finally, concluding and providing the overall evaluation from previous clarification to give an opinion to answer the assigned question II MAIN ANALYSIS Understanding the concept of “CSR” and “Waste management” Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a management concept, which refers to the integration of businesses’ social, environmental, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities toward society and the environment into their contemporary business operations and to interact with stakeholders as well as fulfill their interests (Rasche et al 2017) Waste management alludes to all schemes to manage waste from its initiation to its last destination, including collection, transport, treatment, and disposal of trash, sewage, other byproducts, and substances safely and scientifically (Zeng et al 2021) Possible proper waste management methods are applied with the intention to reduce the number waste and its adverse effects on the environment and population’s health (Murugesan 2020) Waste management is a multifaceted issue that affects many aspects of society and the economy worldwide (Dehoust et al 2013) In 2020, the world was assessed to generate 2.24 billion tons of waste, adding up to a footprint of 0.79 kilograms per individual each day More than 90% of waste is frequently discarded in unregulated dumps or straightforwardly incinerate in most developing nations around the world (WorldBank 2022) These practices create serious disease, threaten global health and safety, and contributes to climate change Many nations worldwide experience the same struggles to eliminate the hazardous impacts of unscientific waste management, thus, waste management is a global challenge that all countries are overcoming Positive and negative impacts of the global business on waste management Many businesses positively impact waste management, and most impacts are from multinational corporations in host-developing countries Firstly, many global businesses operate, bring out and share practical and low-cost waste management knowledge and advanced technologies with low-income communities with little or no waste management infrastructure to support them to avoid damaging impacts from improper waste management For example, Biffa is a UK-leading integrated waste management business that usually donates and transfers its sustainable waste management solutions about treatment, recycling, collection, technologically-driven energy generation techniques, and WM expertise to communities lacking proper waste management, helping them improve how to efficiently manage waste (Biffa 2022) Particularly, management waste software like MyWaste contemplates waste from generation until disposal, it controls what waste, generated source, and the quantity that was generated so it is possible to create prevention, reduction, recycling, reuse, and correct destination of wastes (Mywaste n.d) Some global businesses educate and train their employees in both home and host countries, nurture highly-skilled workforce actively for waste management industries Huge MNCs like Adidas launch movements to pursue environmental sustainability, leading in recycling recycled plastic for shoe production, creating green and competitive effects attracting global customers, that induces other competitors to facilitate sustainable waste management waste approaches, eliminating conventional landfills or dumpsites (Danziger 2019) Overall, waste management is converted in a positive direction for the environment and society In contrast, the increasingly global business operation will increase the amount of waste in the environment, and increase greenhouse gas emissions from trash incineration, climate change, and pollution Higher waste discharge levels will be pressure and difficult for the city's waste treatment because waste generation, especially wastes containing toxic substances from chemical industries, is not classified, and treated well before collection ExxonMobil is the top company discharging most single-use plastic waste into environment and mostly thrown away polluting oceans, being burned or dumped into landfills, which causes stress and is burdensome for the environment and its host countries’ waste treatment procedure (Meredith 2021) How CSR can help businesses to address waste management? The Stakeholder theory is arguably regarded as the most influential theory in the CSR theoretical framework (Crane, Matten & Spence 2014) According to Freeman (1984), stakeholder theory stresses that a business should have the roles and obligations to create the values for their stakeholders, who are individuals or parties proactively impacting on or being influenced by the business’s policies and actions, including companies’ CSR performance Furthermore, the company’s managers hold liability to safeguard stakeholder interests and satisfy the stakeholders’ expectations (Donaldson & Preston 1995) In terms of CSR in waste management, the environment and society (E&S) can be considered business’s stakeholders which changes corresponding to businesses’ waste management decisions and WM consequences Therefore, the obligation of businesses is to connect and understand the environmental and community perspectives and positions on key CSR issues, then integrate their issues into companies’ key operation strategies to generate stakeholders' interests such as maintaining the ecosystem and society balance, protecting their green and development sustainability, and prevent bad agents hurt communities and the environment such as pollution, climate changes, diseases As a result, due to waste management manners of businesses directly related to interests and well-being of E&S, according to the standard ISO 26000, businesses have a duty to take appropriate action to control waste management regimes, be responsible for their direct and indirect impact on the planet described in their CSR policies First, Environmental corporate responsibilities (ECR) should be performed According to ECR theory, the obligations of businesses are to have policies and practices to prevent and alleviate the environmental hazards that may be caused by their commercial activities (Wood 1991) CSR initiatives will lead businesses to maintain well-managed waste management and properly address ineffective WM consequences Following ECR practices, corporations must seek roles and duties to arrange, recover and treatment of hazardous waste and provide safe waste management practices such as reusing, recycling, and reducing waste, instead of relying much on burning or landfills because those regimes can seriously cause environmental pollution Finally, businesses have obligations to prevent, resolve and compensate for negative impacts from improper traditional waste treatment approaches, for example, ecological contamination, antagonistic consequences for the health of the population, global warming intensifies and delaying realization of global sustainable development (Scopetani 2022); increase the reliance on using sustainable sources (paper, glass, or bioplastic) in production to reduce environmental contamination, or convert waste into energy Secondly, the issues of waste management are also related to the Ethical responsibilities (ER) of businesses According to Carroll’s CSR pyramid, ethical responsibilities are obligations to the right thing, be fair, and avoid harm Businesses must express a duty of care that recognize, and respect evolving moral and ethical standards and perform in a way that meets society’s expectations, presented as a Normative perspective (Carroll 1999, Rasche et al 2017) Ethical responsibility consistently contributes to business integrity and transparency Ethical responsibility practices will outline what waste managers are expected to to ensure the safe handling, carrying, and disposal of waste types, with respect to protecting stakeholders’ moral rights (Jones et al 2005) Making businesses be more environmentally friendly also considered an ethical CSR initiative Adoption of CSR expectations including environmental and ethical responsibilities stimulates businesses to recognize the importance of creating a better environment for community involvement CSR practices induce them to think more about their duties toward environmental and social sustainability, that how every bit of waste can be managed efficiently and safely to benefit the E&S rather than just using traditional waste disposal as incineration or just dumping waste in landfills for cost savings, making businesses to commit to their ethics and transparency in operation, align with E&S expectations CSR requires businesses must control their waste amount right throughout their value chain, minimizing non-biodegradable waste such as plastic in the process In the textile industry, chemical industry, and pesticide manufacturing industry, due to CSR, businesses raise their self- awareness and responsibilities to conform rigorously with environmental legislation, comply with the use of chemicals approved by the government, remove banned substances with high potential to be toxic to the environment and people’s health; waste before discharging from those industries must be eliminated toxic and insoluble substances (eg PBDEs, phthalate, crom, formaldehyde, and heavy metals) by special waste-management processes to avoid solid and water contamination Because of CSR intervention, some large businesses in fashion industries shifted their plastic material to recycled or bioplastic to manufacture clothing reducing plastic waste They mostly plan to transfer the waste management manner into modern and green environmental ones such as 3R’s strategies (reduce, reuse, and recycle) or donate Some food industrialized companies will choose WM like animal feeding, fermentation, and composting to resolve food waste (Redman & Redman 2014) Most business implement CSR initiatives as their goals attempt to avoid traditional and unscientific WM ways like landfills, dumpsites, and trash incineration Furthermore, another responsibility of the CSR framework can be applied to address waste management as Philanthropy to the community (Carroll 1991), focusing on community donations to make significant positive community impacts to solve WN challenges WasteAid is a UK waste management charity to share pragmatic and low-cost WM practices with communities in low-income countries help to minimize the waste's harmful effects on the local ecosystem and inhabitants' health Biffa (a UK waste management company) has donated funds annually to support the WasteAid charity’s internal infrastructure to facilitate further solving waste challenge projects (Biffa 2022) Biffa adopted Philanthropic CSR to voluntarily ensure community interests, and places a role to address local waste issues, and challenges created by a lack of waste management in society Adidas raises its brand's awareness and responsibilities in protecting the environment and community's balance by applying CSR perspectives to be environmentally friendly and ethical In 2019, Adidas has gradually transferred material for manufacturing clothes and shoes from virgin polyester fabric in favor of recycled plastics to minimize insoluble plastic waste in the environment Adidas promotes 3R strategies: reduce, reuse, and recycle textiles, avoid burning, and conventional landfills (Adidas 2020) Adidas expands the lifespan of its products to reduce the waste amount thrown away Adidas aims to completely exclude plastic from its processes and across its entire value chain, sending zero plastic waste to landfills It continuously recovers old shoes and clothes from customers to donate to global charities or reuse if they are still in good use With the unrecycled waste or garments that cannot use anymore, Adidas shreds them to become alternative fuels to convert to energy, instead of going into landfills and traditional trash incinerators (Adidas 2020) Accordingly, CSR perspectives are adopted well when Adidas makes their business more environmentally friendly, they work with ethics when concerned more about the impacts of their production activities to avert harmful effects on stakeholders; proactively identify efficient waste management (recycling, donating, and waste to energy) to benefit E&S, avoid applying conventional unscientific WM manners What are the limitations of CSR approaches to waste management? The primary and most significant disadvantage of CSR approaches to waste management is prohibitively expensive, high costs While some large corporations can manage funds for CSR, small businesses bear out of the extra cost involved CSR policies of applying completely sustainable waste management manners such as recycling, composting, and waste to energy, eliminating traditional ones (burning, landfills) will financially burden businesses because they must invest more technologies, advanced equipment, and training employees to conduct WM projects For example, recycling and waste-to-energy process are greener than simply throwing materials away in landfills but 100% much more expensive than landfill because they are complex, have many stages, and may be dangerous CSR in waste management fulfills E&S interests but frustrates other stakeholders (shareholders’ interests) Although CSR waste management initiatives will benefit the interests and well- being of the environment and community by following Environmental and ethical responsibility expectations, in many cases, they violate Economic responsibility (ER) ER is when a company modifies its business processes which must benefit the company by potentially lowering operation costs, strengthening companies' budgets, and simultaneously, benefiting society (Carroll 1991) However, CSR waste management stresses their business’ budget a lot, time and effort so there exist uncompromising arguments of shareholders with management about continuously encouraging and expanding CSR approaches to waste management, which largely impedes CSR considering To persuade environmental sustainability, Adidas recycled marine pollution plastic and uses recycled plastic bottles to replace virgin polyester Adidas recycling plastics is expensive and requires investing in advanced recycling technology to ensure material quality and recycled polyester costs about 10 10% more than virgin plastic There was a time that Adidas management receive many arguments and objections from shareholders about this recycling-producing strategy because they were afraid to lose profits Adidas applies recycling and incinerating waste to transfer to energy Labor working in those waste management processes has suffered many safety challenges under dangerous working conditions They can work with chemical exposure, burnable dust blasts, machine guarding hazards, and exposure to strong gear with moving parts that are unsafe for laborers' wellbeing (LeadPoint 2022) Therefore, Adidas must conduct CSR in the workplace as the business responsibility show duty of care to protect their labor rights, create good working conditions, and comply with CSR legal Occupational Safety and Health (GRI 403) (Freeman et al 2017) CSR waste management will incur other CSR obligations to businesses, and complicate business operations CSR can make a significant contribution to addressing the global challenge of waste management A significant contribution is defined as supplying new key ideas or efforts with an amount or effect that is outstanding enough to be important to address a problem successfully at a noticeable degree, which achieves a result that exceeded expectations and exceptional performance According to previous analyses, comparing the impact extent of both CSR contribution and limitations, it can be included that CSR approaches contribute stand out at 11 higher level to address challenge of waste management and preserve the environment and community Mentioned limitations can be overcome as just need businesses to offer sufficient to protect the health and safety of labor such as rigorous transactions, clear commitment, and proper compensation requirements to guarantee workers’ rights and interests It is reported that most businesses will go on with conventional waste management manners such as trash incineration, landfills, or dump sites because those are cheap and effortless However, applying CSR practices in addressing waste management helps businesses gain more than CSR costs trade-offs This is because CSR leads businesses to be more environmentally friendly, and simultaneously, benefits them to acquire good impressions and goodwill in customers’ views as green, ethical, and E&S responsible corporations, which will highly increase customers’ loyalty, as a result, businesses have more opportunities to achieve greater long-term gains including both yields and renown, gain greater profits from increasing customers’ loyalty will enough compensate the innovate waste-management costs Therefore, those limitations will insignificantly impede CSR contribution Imaging if CSR perspectives are not included as a goal of businesses, not become binding to remind corporations to take their responsibilities and obligations under any waste management decisions and their consequences on E&S, most businesses will actually choose waste management with effortlessness and less-expensive to invest because without concerning the environment and community sustainability development, gaining profits and 12 achieving higher levels are their primary objectives, this will cause environment and society imbalance because mostly reliance on unscientific conventional waste management will increase hazardous challenges such as pollution, climate changes, environment contamination, diseases Moreover, organizations that ignore CSR run a gamble on their bottom line and their image Having a terrible standing socially and environmentally can make serious adverse consequences on the general profitability and success of an organization since currently customers primarily spend on products and services that they trust and engage in businesses that follow ethical approaches that satisfy their own beliefs Not only CSR models can expand businesses’ global position and income, but also, they additionally advance change and progress in their mindset about the awareness to defend E&S health throughout the world CSR orients businesses to change waste disposal practices for the better, consistently going with the path of preserving and pursuing long-term development sustainability of the environment and community, thus to achieve this goal, businesses are forced to eliminate poor-managed waste management from their operation processes in order not to lose points and competitive positions in-front-of potential customers, so that problems arising from unscientific waste treatment approaches will be removed, that can’t cause threat for E&S well-being The fact of the environment and people's living health no longer threatened due to ineffective and unscientific waste management of contemporary businesses, which are consuming the country's resources but cause a menace to nations’ sustainability, is the most expected result of society Consistent with CSR initiatives orientation, they accomplish main results: First, many corporations 13 raise awareness for both internal and external sites of businesses about the necessity and morality of playing duties to balance the E&S And second, they promote the process of more sustainable waste management (recycling, reuse, waste to energy, bio-compositing, etc) to replace conventional ones (landfills, incineration or dumping) so that E&S experience is less hazardous As a result, it is believed CSR adoption drives greatly significant contributions in guiding businesses to transform their vision of sustainable development in waste management which mutually benefits businesses and their stakeholders in long run III CONCLUSION In conclusion, CSR is described as that business and society are interwoven in that businesses integrate the issues of the environment and society into their operation strategies and have certain expectations for appropriate business behavior and outcomes toward their stakeholders Waste management is the act of managing the discharged waste safely and scientifically to eliminate hazardous impacts of such waste on the environment and community such as health, climate change, pollution, environmental contamination, an imbalance ecosystem, etc It is believed that waste management is a global challenge since many countries worldwide both developed and developing have suffered a large amount of waste discharged into the environment daily, however, not every country applies the proper and scientific WM approaches 14 Besides, global businesses both positively and negatively impact waste management systems On the positive side, MNCs provide advanced knowledge and technologies and transfer practical WM methods to help ones with lack or have no resources about how to effectively manage waste, businesses train and educate labor about WM techniques, while some businesses initiate CSR movements that inspire others to follow to compete However, there also exist some companies that pressure waste management efforts with increase waste emitting without toxic pretreatment, causing stress for E&S While CSR can induce businesses to raise 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