Peter Po Tak Tse, Chief Executive Officer, CTPS China
Over the last 10 to 15 years, corporate responsibility has been widely discussed and addressed in many business sectors in China. It was, however, not a popular and priority issue for many Chinese printers. Reed Elsevier, a company that strongly believes in social responsibility, was the first customer promoting corporate responsibility to CTPS in 2004.
My first reaction was rather conservative as it meant reduced working hours, more shift breaks, no Sunday working, overtime payments – all likely to raise costs, reduce profit margins and ultimately threaten our business viability. After a year of trial implementation, these concerns no longer existed. Reduced working hours and sufficient rest time has proven to be beneficial as workers come to work every day in good condition, able to meet daily production challenges and thus reducing quality issues due to lack of rest. The introduction of health and safety procedures has greatly reduced compensation for work injuries. With the enjoyment of a safer and better workplace, worker loyalty to the company has significantly increased. The result of this is a lower worker turnover rate that has greatly reduced our hiring and training costs.
Corporate responsibility is now an important mission for CTPS management. It goes beyond the statutory obligation to comply with legislation. We voluntarily take steps to introduce higher standards to improve quality of life and working conditions for our employees. Regular improvements made to employee living areas, above-minimum pay salary structures, a fully air-conditioned workplace, introduction of alcohol-free fountain solution and other low VOC chemicals, and participation in a cleaner production partnership programme with the Hong Kong Productivity Council, are some of our key achievements.
To ensure corporate responsibility is sustainable in CTPS, we have designated personnel at senior management level to perform regular inspections. Through partnership with Reed Elsevier, CTPS has been able to make reference to RE corporate policy thus enabling us to advance our corporate responsibility standards to an international level. Our employee training and development programme, labour relationships, equal employment opportunity policy, and health and safety policy are among the best in the Pearl River Delta Area. CTPS is an Employee Most Satisfied Enterprise as nominated by the local government authority.
I am pleased with my decision in taking these pioneering steps to introduce corporate responsibility to CTPS. I look forward to further developing this issue together with Reed Elsevier.