Progress

Social

• The further development of Synovate CARES and local community programmes in Aegis Media, while scoping aims, strategy and potential partners for a global Aegis Media community programme.
• A first Aegis Group-wide survey to measure the value of our community involvement. This covered countries representing 64% of Group revenue. A total of 6,183 Aegis employees took part in local community initiatives, supporting charities and organisations through donations and in-kind support. This represented 37% of our total workforce.
• The value of employee community support in 2008 was £2.7m, equivalent to 1.7% of 2008 pre-tax profit. Total value of time amounted to £0.2m (although we believe this is a conservative measurement). The value of in-kind gifts was £0.5m and total financial donations and funds raised were £2.0m.

Environmental

• The completion of a data collection exercise covered countries representing 85.7% of Group revenue (87.1% of Aegis Media, 83.5% of Synovate) and Aegis head office. Energy* and business travel were identified as the main drivers of CO₂ impact, which was 31,226 metric tonnes, or 1.78 metric tonnes per capita.

Overall CO2 per employee (metric tonnes)						1.78
		1.02
				0.76
*Energy does not include gas, oil, coal or biomass as these are not widely used in our industry and we received almost no data on these energy types.
Source		Energy*		Business travel		Total

• Other areas of impact were surveyed, most significantly paper. Total consumption was 20,815 reams. Reduction of consumption and an increase in recycled paper content will be monitored in 2009 and 2010; we have an internal target of a 20% reduction by 2010.
• Action plans were developed to reduce our environmental footprint and increase our social impact in 80% of the countries where we operate.
• A policy initiative on travel has promoted measures such as parking cash-out schemes and financial incentives for employees to purchase bicycles, where locally possible, as indicated in country action plans. This will be encouraged in 2009.
• The introduction of sustainable IT practices across our businesses with the introduction of new IT standards is being encouraged. Currently 97% of countries within Aegis Media recycle IT equipment.
• Procurement standards have been developed to promote best practice to all our companies.
• Implementation of a policy on the inclusion of sustainable building design and infrastructure to relevant national environmental performance standards, for existing and new offices.

Economic

• Initiatives have been taken to develop specific products for clients. They include the acquisition of Clownfish, an international sustainability and communications consultancy which has developed SOAP, a product that allows clients to better communicate their sustainability agenda with authenticity and credibility.