RBC bank (Canada) & sustainability Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

RBC bank (Canada) & sustainability - Essay Example and 56 other countries1. Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability The company claims to have positive economic, environmental and social impact in its areas of operations. In the view of the President and CEO of the company Gordon M. Nixon corporate responsibility for the company is about the way company uses and makes money2. Company has set six priorities for its corporate social responsibility which are operational integrity, economic impact, market place, work place, environment and community. Within the environmental priorities company is determined to reduce the intensity of the environmental footprint of RBC Canada, promote environmentally responsible business activities and offer environmental products and services3. Sustainable Growth and Priorities of RBC Canada RBC Canada has developed and adopted significant policies and procedures for the sustainable developments which are included in the corporate priorities. Some of these are as follow: Reduce the Intensity o f the Environmental Footprint of RBC RBCs environmental footprint consists of range of activities of the company from the internal environment to the external environment. Company has tracked all the areas of operations that can have environmental impact and identified the ways to minimize the environmental impact. These include use of energy, paper consumption, and water use and procurement activities. In these areas company is minimizing its environmental footprint. Vital statistics4 Greenhouse Gas Emissions The company studied and identified the direct and indirect greenhouse gas emission by the company. This includes the source of electricity, production and distribution of documents and employee travel5. The company has Carbon Disclosure Project submission6. The key highlights of the progress of the company indicate that there are number of energy and greenhouse gas related initiatives. They launched a multi-year Energy Management Plan across the retail branch network in Canada . This consists of 200 lighting retrofits and 80 heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) efficiency assessment7. The company has drafted a comprehensive policy for their environmental and risk management policy. As per this policy all the management decisions should be consider social and environmental risk. There have been tremendous developments in order to make this policy workable in the organization such as assessment of client’s environmental management systems, liabilities, community relations, environmental and labor regulations, community relations and the overall impact on air, land and water. They provided training to 250 employees of RBC Capital Market and Group Risk Management. These people were trained so that the new policy can be applied successfully. In the commercial lending activities, company has been taking care in the commercial lending activities in accordance with this policy. There have been various training provided to risk managers on envir onmental risks and risk management in various lending and investment banking. It has also transferred many of the paper related activities through the electronic documentation process and saved nearly 11.3 million sheets of

Louisiana Purchase Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Louisiana Purchase - Research Paper Example In addition, the US government had to cancel a $ 3,650, 000 owed by France. Louisiana had become a major issue in the European history following the defeat of the Britain by France. This essay will therefore analyze the acquisition of Louisiana by the United States and its implication on the European political history. The city of Orleans was strategically located on river Mississippi and, hence it provided a good control point for activities that took place in the waterways. It acquisition was therefore significant to the US economy during that time. The main reason why the United States needed to acquire the territory is that, it was the easiest channel to the Gulf of Mexico. River Mississippi was vital to the United States economy since it served as an entry point for goods leaving United States and goods coming into the country (Ziegler 1988, 85). During that time, the country heavily depended on water transport, as it did not have access to other transport system. The US depende d on the Mississippi waterway to transport most agricultural products such as tobacco and cotton from the upper states. The rights to be able to navigate through rivers Mississippi and Ohio were therefore significant the United States (United States. Dept. of State, 1905, 122-125). The United States also needed to control the region in order to reduce the financial cost that it was incurring due to the French and Spanish control over the area. Initially US merchants had to pay hefty sums of money as tax in order to use the Mississippi and Ohio waterways. The US government therefore needed to gain control over the city in order to boost its trade balance by reducing the operation cost incurred by merchants from the country. Other than trade, the US population was expanding rapidly due to the large number of immigrants who were settling into the country from Europe. The US therefore, needed to expand its territory in order to achieve its expansion ambitions. The high population growth also had a direct influence on the United States’ economy. The US government therefore needed to be aggressive in the acquisition of land for its citizens. The acquisition of Orleans proved to the world that the United States had become fully independent from European powers. The Spanish and French forces that controlled the region posed a major threat for the expansion of the United States; the US needed to acquire the territory in order to end their control over the region. The acquisition marked the end of the western frontier enabling the country’s expansion to the west coast. France entered into war with other European powers from 1792 to 1795 under the leadership of Napoleon. The French forces were fighting in both the European and American frontiers. During the war, France incurred heavy costs that may have pushed Napoleon to sell off Louisiana to the Americans. The French army also suffered heavy casualties and this forced Napoleon to sell the territory to the Americans. The sale of Louisiana came at a time when the French army was preparing for war against the British in the northern frontier. To maintain the war Napoleon needed finances to pay the army and to provide essential supplies to the French soldiers. The French army also lacked appropriate military hardware that the government needed to acquire in order to maintain the war. During the war, Napoleon needed to control his army and the newly

Literature review of manufacturing consent the political economy of Essay

Literature review of manufacturing consent the political economy of the mass media - Essay Example They state that the way in which the media reports news is normally not the most objective since it works towards the protection of the interests of those individuals with influence within the society and completely ignores those of the masses. As a result, there has developed a situation where the news which the mass media produces for public consumption is no longer necessarily in the interests of the public since it is often distorted to serve the interests of a few individuals. The news is no longer as accurate as it should be because of the fact that there is always a bias towards those who have a massive influence on the media outlets, making the latter to be ineffective in their obligations towards the public. It is mainly these issues among many others that are discussed in the book and this makes the book a very important read for those who are interested in how mass media works. Among the most fundamental issues of concern that are discussed in the book is concerning the growing size of media empires as well as their orientation to profit making (Herman & Chomsky, 1988). The principal mass media channels are large companies which are run for profit and because of this; their actions have been aimed at the realization of profits and nothing more. These institutions have been designed to cater to the financial interest of their owners, most of who have massive corporate interest, or are involved in the development of their own personal interests (Buehler, 2011). The size of media companies can be considered an indispensable product of the capital requirements for the technology to reach a massive audience, since it is through the latter that they can be able to set their agenda to the public. The global integration of media ownership is a serious issue that is tackled in the book and it can be concluded that the global integration of mass media leads to less freedom

The retail environment of clothing apparel organization Abercrombie & Essay

The retail environment of clothing apparel organization Abercrombie & Fitch in terms of pervading retail theory - Essay Example One such company is the teen clothing store Abercrombie & Fitch. Through reference to contemporary retail theory, this report investigates Abercrombie & Fitch’s retail environment. Abercrombie & Fitch Background While Abercrombie & Fitch is popularly recognized for its modern fashions and pop culture style, the company has a long history dating back to the 19th century. Indeed, David Abercrombie and Ezra Fitch founded the company as a sporting goods store in 1892 (Zuidhof 2007). During the early 20th century David Abercrombie left the organization, but Ezra Fitch continued operations. Fitch would witness successful company operations and expansion until his retirement in 1928 (Zuidhof 2007). During the period Fitch controlled the organization they expanded from sporting goods to a wide-array of amenities, including clothing and board games. The organization was the first company to carry the game Mahjong and they even outfitted Charles Lindberg for his flight across the Atlant ic. After Fitch’s retirement his brother-in-law James S. Cobb purchased the organization. After Cobb assumed controlled the organization further expanded, purchasing Von Lengerke & Detmold, a European dealer of sportings guns. The company continued in relative prosperity until the 1970s when they increasingly experienced declining revenue. Ultimately, the company was forced to declare chapter 11 bankruptcy. In 1977 the company closed until it was bought in 1978 by sporting goods retailer Oshman’s for $1.5 million (Zuidhof 2007). The Oshman era experienced tepid success until it was bought out in 1988 by Limited Brands (Zuidhof 2007). New president Sally Frame-Kasak would move the organization into a decidedly fashion retail direction. This direction was further enhanced in 1992 when clothing executive Michael S. Jeffries assumed the presidency. Jeffries would further shift company emphasis from simply clothing to teenage apparel. From this 1992 period until the present day the company has largely maintained this market structure and has expanded with relative success. The contemporary incarnation of Abercrombie & Fitch five brands: Abercrombie & Fitch, AbercrombieKids, Hollister and RUEHL and Gilly Hicks: Sydney brands. While each of these brands reaches out to different market segments structural changes in the retail environment, the Abercrombie & Fitch storefront, with its ‘classic cool’ theme, remains the flagship offering. Analysis Overarching Theoretical Paradigm One of the most overarching concerns in terms of Abercrombie & Fitch’s contemporary retail environment is the notion of the servicescape. Broadly speaking, the servicescape is the impact of the physical environment in which a service takes place. Booms and Bitner (1981, pg. 36) first established the notion of the servicescape, noting it is, â€Å"the environment in which the service is assembled and in which the seller and customer interact, combined with tangi ble commodities that facilitate performance or communication of the service.† Not merely Abercrombie & Fitch, but indeed all retail environments, this is a pervasive notion for its nearly all-encompassing subject criteria; indeed, Bitner (1992) expanded this notion to include three physical environ

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Term Paper

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act - Term Paper Example Finally, the essay will look into the application and implantation of reforms to a healthcare institution. There are eight major elements of the Act as outlined by The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (2010). The first has to do with expanding access to health insurance coverage to most citizens. This is supported by the second element, which entails the provision of financial help to low-income individuals and families. With the second element, there is an automatic expansion of health insurance coverage to citizens. The third element provides for new competitive marketplaces for entities to acquire health insurance, while at the same time ensuring consumer protection in private health insurance. The fifth element looks into closing gaps in the Medicare program that have been costly. The sixth element allows for provision of preventative care, devoid of co-pays or deductibles. This is supported by the seventh element, which promotes movement towards payment systems that reward excellent care for the patient, coupled with positive outcomes, as opposed to rewarding the volume of care. Elements six and seven promote intensive care for the patient, over extensive care. Preventative care is a large component of quality care; it takes up minimal resources in comparison to care aimed at curing the ailment. The last element promotes more transparency and reporting among healthcare practitioners. This element encompasses all the rest because for the PPACA to take full effect there is need to ensure that all practitioners are playing their role towards ensuring such effectiveness. One of the key changes to operations in the hospital is the evolution of healthcare delivery systems from a mid-level care kind of delivery model to a more virtual care kind (National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, 2014). This is

Micro Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 3

Micro - Essay Example Knowledge and data helps in the identification and may show factors to survival, activity, and death of the subject pathogen. Eschericheria coli 0104:H4 is the name of the health concern while Eschericheria coli is the pathogen that causes the health concern, a bacterial pathogen. The name of the health concern includes the name of the pathogen and even though only the concern is identified, the inclusion means identification of the pathogen. The statement also identifies the concern as an outbreak to establish its significance, in addition to explaining that the concern is an enemy among the human population. Consequently, the statement contributes to risk analysis through identification of a hazard Hazard characterization is another significant element of risk analysis and its absence from the statement undermines risk analysis aspect. An outline of the nature and degree of effects of an identified hazard is the main feature of hazard characterization. Identification of levels of the pathogen that is harmful to different population segments such as segments by gender and by age groups would be an example of hazard characterization and can be quantitative or qualitative. Even though the statement identifies existence of lessons that have been developed from occurrence of the hazard, the identification is too general, failing to communicate scope of the problem and its severity level. Incidence rate of the health concern and time that it takes to overwhelm the body or even a description of its severity would have established hazard characterization. Being devoid of these aspects therefore means that the statement fails in risk analysis. The statement is also devoid of exposure assessment. One of the key elements of exposure assessment is data on existence of pathogens in raw materials to a subject food. exposure assessment also meets criteria of risk analysis if

Questions and comments on graph and starbucks Essay

Questions and comments on graph and starbucks - Essay Example Euro will definitely make it difficult for European economies to compete in the global market due to comparatively low prices offered by non-European economies. Starbucks’ understanding towards the increase in exchange rate for Euro vs Dollars has saved it from making an investment, which would have resulted in lower revenues earning; however, the other issue of tax avoidance is a considerable one, which not only focuses on the taxation policies but also increases the political risk associated with such practices. The fact that the actions of the company can affect the political risk has to be considered, which will definitely be another setback for the operations of the company in the European market (Kapil). The management of Starbucks shall be concerned about the risks associated with foreign currency translations, which may affect the profitability of the company and thereby deviate unfavourably from projected figures. In this regard, the fact that the company has started using forward contracts to cover risks associated with foreign currency translation is a positive step. The fact that there is a risk associated with such practice is still acceptable while keeping in view the greater risk associated with losses incurred in foreign currency translations