One of the first projects I became involved in when I joined GRI in 2001 was the development of a resource for companies and organizations to use as the basis for reporting on how they were coping with HIV and AIDS in the workplace. The project was timely because during the period 1997-2001 the epidemic grew from an estimated 20 million infections to 30 million infections worldwide. By 2001 businesses, especially those with operations in Africa, South America and Eastern Europe, were just beginning to feel the affects of this devastating disease, and were grappling with how to respond in ways that would protect their employees and their bottom lines.

UNAIDS recently released its annual report on the global AIDS epidemic showing that the total number of people living with HIV or AIDS has somewhat stabilized and is estimated to be at about the 33 million mark. This prompted me to look back on that HIV/AIDS reporting resource and to see how far companies have come since 2001.

I found that over the past decade businesses have been severely impacted by HIV in their workforce, communities, customer base, and supply chains which has caused concern as a risk with material financial impacts for some analysts and investors. Most significantly companies have felt the loss of tremendous talent since the epidemic began.  Unwarranted fear and ignorance of the disease have caused discrimination and disrupted work and employee productivity, and AIDS has generated more individual lawsuits across a broad range of health issues than any other disease in history.

There is significant quantitative and qualitative data to suggest that companies working to address HIV/AIDS in the workplace experience a variety of direct and indirect bottom-line benefits. Some of these include:

·                     Unhampered growth in markets

·                     Increased productivity

·                     Decreased costs of health care and other employee benefits:

·                     Reduced employer liability:

·                     Continued workforce diversity:

·                     Lower rates of employee turnover:

·                     Improved employee morale:

In addition to the clear business case for responding to HIV, there is also an undeniable moral case. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) predates the HIV/AIDS crisis, however, observance of the rights identified therein are central to an effective response to HIV/AIDS, they include: the right to non-discrimination and equality; the right to health; to liberty and security of the person; to privacy; to seek receive and impart information; to marry and found a family; to work; and the right to freedom of movement, association, and expression. As the human rights agenda increases in importance for businesses, AIDS response goes right along with it.

As a part of the multi-stakeholder based development process for the GRI HIV/AIDS reporting resource document back in 2001, we piloted the tool with 18 companies operating in southern Africa. For most, it was the first time they had experimented with monitoring, measuring and reporting on AIDS related performance. I decided to check in on some of these companies and others to see how far we had come since the GRI HIV/AIDS resource document was released.

For my sample I selected 50 companies randomly from the membership of the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS – assuming all the companies involved in this organization would have active AIDS programs in place. I selected 10 companies from a variety of sectors from each of Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, and South America. I then looked to the GRI resource document and selected six key indicators as proxies to see if I could piece together a broad picture on the level of activity and the level of transparency on HIV in the workplace. The table below contains my findings.

Table 1: Number of companies that disclose various aspects about their HIV/AIDS performance (total of 10 companies for each region were examined).

It is not surprising to see that 70-80% of the companies sampled from Africa have very active HIV management programs in place, from strategy, to policy, programs, and results, as this is the region that is hardest hit by the epidemic - some workplaces are coping with 20-30% infection rates among their staff. I was impressed with the level of transparency these companies were exhibiting about the state of AIDS in their companies. Back in 2001 most companies were very hesitant about putting this information into the public domain.

Europe and North America are not as hard hit as other regions, but for companies that typically strive for top notch non-discrimination, employee training, and health and safety program their records are fairly weak on HIV management – or they are simply not disclosing their performance.

Most worrying is the performance and level of disclosure on HIV/AIDS from companies in Asia and Latin America. Some parts of Asia are experiencing infection rates that span from 1% up to 15% of the population, while South America battles rates in the 1%-5% range. The very low level of activity, transparency, or both from companies in these regions indicates they are missing an enormous opportunity to strengthen their workforce, communities and markets. 

Greater levels of transparency can help reduce misunderstandings and miseducation about HIV. It also helps companies keep close watch on whether or not their programs are being effective and helps employees, customers, regulators, and investors make better decisions about how they want to interact with the company.

Alyson Slater

www.alysonslater.com

alysonslater@mac.com

Links:

UNAIDS report: http://www.unaids.org/en/KnowledgeCentre/HIVData/GlobalReport/2008/2008_Global_report.asp

Global Business Coalition Against HIV/AIDS: www.gbcimpact.org/

GRI HIV/AIDS Reporting Resource Document