The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Our priorities

We place particular importance on SDGs 4 and 12. SDG 4, which seeks to support quality education, is a key part of our corporate responsibility action in which we provide financial and volunteer effort to enable people to contribute to their own and broader development. We also focus on SDG 12 which seeks to promote more prudent management of the world’s natural resources. As a luxury goods supplier, it is vital for us to understand and respond to changes in consumer preference and demand.

	Why it’s important?	How we are contributing?
	We believe strongly in the importance and power of education, for all people. Education is vital in enabling everyone to maximise their potential and for the creation of stable societies.	We invest in impactful education programs yearly centred on supporting 1,300 of displaced children fill the gap in their primary education. We share our knowledge with university students from all over the world and support entrepreneurs with practical skills to run their businesses. A total of 74% of our employees in UAE have received formal L&D training to improve their adaptability to technology and workplace matters. We sponsored 22 students’ scholarships to attend reputable universities. We invested $1 million in an e-learning platform to support displaced and low-income students with access to quality education.
	Changing patterns of consumption is essential for sustainable use of the world’s natural resources.	We are working increasingly with our suppliers and brands to ensure that our products are sourced and produced in a responsible way. We are also examining how we can promote more responsible consumption.

Supporting other goals

We also contribute to many of the other SDGs through the way in which we conduct our own business and the voluntary efforts of our people.

		How we are contributing?
	Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages	We promote active and heath lifestyles among our employees, by encouraging a good work life balance. We have a wide-ranging health and wellbeing programme for our employees. We support Friends of Cancer Patients and other philanthropic initiatives. We support many projects in education, providing opportunity for young people to better themselves.
	Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls	We are a signatory of the UN Women Empowerment Principles. We have recently enhanced the benefits of our maternity and paternity leave programmes. We have committed to increase the percentage of women in senior management to 25% by 2020, and in middle management roles to 50% by 2020. We are an equal opportunity employer. We cultivate an inclusive work environment, which values people regardless of gender.
	Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all	We employ approximately 12,000 people, providing good quality jobs, in 14 countries. We own more than 600 retail outlets across the region. We provide a wide range of careers and career paths, offering tremendous opportunities for training and development. We support broader economic and social goals, such as those enshrined in Dubai 21. We strongly support innovation and have set up mechanisms to promote and share new business ideas through our ‘Ibtikar’ and Greenhouse initiatives. We have a large and diverse supply chain thereby supporting employment in many other organisations.
	Reduce inequality within and among countries	We support diversity and inclusion in our workplace and have workers from 115 nationalities. We support community activities across the Gulf region, including the provision of humanitarian aid to groups of people in need, such as refugees.
	Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts	We have programmes in place to manage our environmental impacts to air, water and land and have systems in place to measure and report on our performance. We have installed renewable solar energy in much of our property portfolio. We take steps to minimise our energy use and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Our property portfolio includes buildings which are LEED certified and we support individuals seeking LEED Green Associate certification. We seek good sustainability practices in our supply chain, and both challenge and support our suppliers.
	Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalise the global partnership for sustainable development	We work with and donate to organisations such as UNICEF and Dubai Cares. We are committed to and report on our commitment to the UN Global Compact. We partner with Gulf-led organisation Pearl Initiative to promote accountability and transparency in our company. In 2017, we became signatories of the UN Women’s Empowerment Principles. We partner with other organisations such as Goumbook and Emirates Environmental Group (EEG) on initiatives to safeguard the environment, such as zero waste to landfill.