Global Call to Action for the Private Sector to Fight Corruption and Put Anti-Corruption On the UN's Post-2015 Map
Year-long campaign to ensure that future global framework is grounded in ethical business practices and good governance
New Delhi, 9 April 2013 /3BL Media/ – The UN Global Compact today launched a global call to action to mobilize the private sector against corruption. In order for global development efforts to benefit the poor as well as empower ethical players, business leaders are asked to refuse to engage in graft, and to urge Governments to promote anti-corruption measures and to establish systems of good governance worldwide.
“Sustainable development cannot be achieved without tackling one of the greatest systemic barriers to healthy societies and economic growth – corruption,” said Olajobi Makinwa, Head of Transparency and Anti-Corruption Initiatives for the UN Global Compact. “Corruption distorts markets, undermines development and makes business unsustainable. It is time for businesses to showcase their commitment to bring this critical global challenge into the centre of global development debates.”
As the Millennium Development Goals 2015 deadline approaches, the United Nations is working to develop a new global development framework, and business has a central role to play. To prevent future development priorities from being undermined by corruption, business participants say it is critical to integrate good governance and anti-corruption into the post-2015 UN Development Agenda.
The Call to Action to Governments from the Private Sector on Anti-Corruption and the Post-2015 Development Agenda asks more than 7,000 Global Compact business participants to join forces with Governments and to encourage them to create enabling environments for more robust disclosure, transparency and enforcement mechanisms that contribute to sustainable development – particularly in the area of public procurement. As part of a year-long global campaign, the Call to Action seeks to showcase the private sector’s commitment to transparency and anti-corruption as new global development priorities are established. (Read the complete Call to Action.)
The campaign was launched today at a New Delhi meeting of the Global Compact’s Working Group on the 10th Principle Against Anti-Corruption. A high-level panel session on “Opportunities for Business in Supporting the Post-2015 Development Agenda” was co-convened with the Global Compact Network India in an effort to raise awareness of the importance of anti-corruption in a global development context. Delegates from Global Compact Local Networks in India, Nigeria, Egypt, and Germany – many of which are already engaged in anti-corruption collective action projects – expressed support for the Call to Action and are helping to galvanize business leaders in favour of ethical corporate practices.
"The UN Global Compact's Call to Action is an important step in fostering greater public-private collaboration to combat corruption and achieve development goals,” said Elaine Dezenski, Senior Director and Head of the World Economic Forum's Partnering Against Corruption Initiative (PACI), which will convene a joint session with the Global Compact during the final day of the meeting. She added: “It underlines not only the crucial role business, government and civil society have to play but how this collective action is critical to the business agenda – when companies collaborate to eliminate corruption and build a more transparent environment for doing business, everyone benefits."
The Global Compact will feature a complete list of companies and other organizations who have signed onto the Call to Action at its triennial Leaders Summit in September 2013, where business will have the chance to shape the post-2015 development agenda and put forward an architecture for business to contribute to global priorities.
The Call to Action is available online at http://www.unglobalcompact.org/Issues/transparency_anticorruption/call_to_action_post2015.html.
About the UN Global Compact
Launched in 2000, the United Nations Global Compact is a both a policy platform and a practical framework for companies that are committed to sustainability and responsible business practices. As a multi-stakeholder leadership initiative, it seeks to align business operations and strategies with ten universally accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption, and to catalyze actions in support of broader UN goals. With more than 7,000 corporate signatories in over 140 countries, it is the world’s largest voluntary corporate sustainability initiative. www.unglobalcompact.org
