CSR Activities of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group

Company Outline

CSR Message

Top Management Message

Corporate Philosophy

CSR of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group

Report on Compliance and Company-wide Activities

Compliance Activities of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group

Company-wide Activities of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group

Report on Preservation Activities for Global Environmental

Chief Environment Officer's Message

Environmental Management Endeavors

Development of New System – iNDr

Environmental Recycling Machinery

Global Warming Countermeasures

Report on Social and Regional Activities

Kobelco Construction Machinery CSR Fund

Diverse CSR Activities

Employees' Comments

Editor's Postscript

CSR Activities of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group from Employees' Perspectives
Employees who have assumed roles in Kobelco Construction Machinery Group's CSR activities talk about sentiments they have felt through the activities.

I moved to my present post in July 2007 and first got involved with CSR activities here. Before that the thing I was most concerned about was "how to sell machines" and frankly I didn't have much sense of affinity with CSR activities. That may be why I have memories of being a little embarrassed to begin with when I took part in local contribution activities or implemented educational activities. But my concern for the activities gradually grew as I was inspired by the actively participative stance of all the employees and the passionate attitudes of the CSR Promotion Group and CSR Promotion Committee members.
The activity circumstances often bring me into contact with neighborhood volunteer groups and the residents of Shinagawa Ward, and what I notice when I observe these people is their powerful sentiment of "wanting to make their own part of town into a better place". As a member of Kobelco Construction Machinery Co., Ltd. headquartered in Osaki, I would like to carry out positive activities even more deeply rooted in this locale than before, so as to contribute to building better neighborhoods. I want to unite with the local people in thinking about the future.
In the times ahead we will be broadening the scope of the activities to take in Shinagawa Ward as well as the Osaki district, and working in unison with the local people to broaden the sphere of the activities to the whole of the Kobelco Construction Machinery Group.

I am in charge of CSR for the training centers and have been involved with installation of AEDs in the training centers nationwide, the centers' interactions with the Hiro Gakuen and schools for the disabled, and other aspects. As I believe that such activities should not be done under orders but should be sustained by spontaneous sentiment, I have always taken special care not to be "pushy" when appealing for participation inside the company or doing educational activities. In fact, what generated the motivation for everyone was, I think, when they were at a gathering with the children, who said "Thank you" with beaming faces. I think that CSR activities have spread through the company because they enable people to experience their efforts having effect. Nowadays I get asked questions such as "How should I set about applying to the CSR fund?" and I'm immensely pleased that the kind of ethos has emerged that has people spontaneously thinking "Isn't there some social contribution I could make?"
There are still issues, I think. However, if one thinks in terms of "let each person do the things they can, to the extent they can", then even now there are still plenty of things that can be done and however one looks at it what is really important is to carry them out on an ongoing basis. Because my goal is to make us into an enterprise that is trusted and of which people will say "That's Kobelco!"

As a member of the Ogaki Factory's CSR Promotion Committee I act as a communication channel between the Ogaki Factory and the CSR Promotion Group, and besides that I've also been involved in the endeavors specific to the Ogaki Factory such as the social gatherings and Flowers All Over campaign. When we were first selected onto the CSR Promotion Committee we had no knowledge at all about CSR and started out by considering "What are we ourselves able to do?" That's how the Flowers All Over campaign was born. We planned it simply out of a desire to "make our own workplaces beautiful". The number of people approving of it steadily rose, and now we're at the point where we get demands for "More flower-planting!" It's most gratifying to me that so many employees give up their precious lunchbreak time to take part in this campaign. And for someone like me who's completely ignorant about flowers, receiving instruction – and some pep talks too! – from older people was highly meaningful insofar as they are my seniors who've gone before me in life, and in many different senses I've really learned a lot.
For myself, CSR activities are now highly enjoyable, and what with the joy of achieving things together with all the others, now I even feel like "I can't wait" for the next one. I hope that the sphere of the activities will expand further.

I have been involved in the CSR activities since their launching and am currently in the CSR Promotion Group, in charge mainly of Ogaki Factory and employee education activities. When the CSR activities were first begun I had misgivings whether everyone would take interest in them. But as the days have passed, understanding of CSR has developed little by little across the company and the number of employees engaged in it has grown. As a member of the CSR Promotion Group I'm happier about that than about anything. I think it's a big achievement that information about our day-to-day, modest CSR activities and our contributions to local communities has been broadcast to all our employees and to the general public in the form of the Socio-Environmental Report.
Today, seeing everyone responding to the Bring-Your-Own-Cup campaign and sorting the garbage without bring instructed to by anyone and without a sense of it being anything strange, I feel that a change may well have taken place in the mindset of all the employees – myself included – and that it's a change for the better. This is the product of small accumulations of day-to-day efforts, and I've become deeply aware how important such efforts are.
In the future as before, I will be working to enable the continuation of such accumulations of modest efforts that are suited to our abilities.

I have been active for one year as a CSR Promotion Committee member at Kobelco Construction Machinery (Nishinihon) Co. Ltd. Besides giving education in CSR activities in my own company, I have generated suggestions for panel exhibits at exhibitions and carried out externally-aimed PR. When I was first selected to be a CSR Promotion Committee member I was in difficulty as I wasn't sure what CSR was or what it involved doing. But I think that information disclosure is one of the corporate social responsibilities, and so I thought up the panel exhibits.
I am of the opinion that CSR is the backbone of an enterprise, which is to say that it relates to all operations of all departments. It has been highly significant for me to think along the same vectors as people in positions of all different kinds, and I have done nothing but learn from it. Around me I have seen people taking the lead in participation in local events, taking measures for paperless offices and against harmful substances, and in other ways engaging in "activities suited to our abilities" – activities which have accomplished a solid expansion.
I have a feeling that lately "sympathy" has become diluted, including in myself. I believe that having sympathy for local communities, other employees and their families in one's endeavors is an important matter – the foundation of CSR activities, in fact. Accordingly I would like us to try doing activities that might help such sympathies to spread, at externally-oriented venues such as exhibitions.