Günter Geyer Award for social conscience
Doing good together
Prevention and assistance in the social and health sectors, cooperation with NGOs that work with disadvantaged people, and the renovation of a school in a rural area - all activities that pursue one goal: namely, to help. It is precisely such commitments that are honoured with the "Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience". Since 2012, the award, named after the Chairman of our Supervisory Board, has been awarded to VIG insurance companies that have made exceptional contributions to society through their activities or the activities of their employees.
As in previous years, the 2022 award winners are characterized by outstanding social commitment:
The extraordinary social commitment of Czech Kooperativa has many faces. The company has already been honored twice for its social activities with the Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience. In this year, the first place went once again to Czech Kooperativa. The company has already established its own foundation in 2013, with which Kooperativa has since been helping civil society. The Kooperativa Foundation is particularly active in the social and health sectors and supports organizations that deal with the prevention and care of mental health, For a long time, they support organizations that help people with disabilities to live a dignified life in the home environment.
The award was won, among other things, for cooperation with non-profit organization Nevypust duši. The collaboration emphasizes prevention, inclusion of teaching about mental health in schools and public education. A partial goal is also to open a public discussion about mental health as a normal part of human life.
Kooperativa wants people with disabilities to be able to live a free life and not be forced by the system to go to institutions. In cooperation with NGO Asistence they support pilot program 5th GRADE (pátý stupeň). Kooperativa is convinced that all people with disabilities should be able to use the support of other people to the extent that they can live freely. The current system does not allow this, so Kooperativa paid for five people personal assistance as many hours of assistance as they need and the company continuously monitors how their lives have changed. We will obtain data to promote systemic change - the introduction of the fifth individualized level of care allowance.
he Czech Paraplegics Association is also supported by Kooperativa: Under the project title "BanalFatal! the association uses lectures in schools to the severity of spinal column and spinal cord injuries caused by supposedly banal situations – such as jumping headfirst into water, slipping or falling down.
In addition, Kooperativa serves customers with hearing impairments through a special service which transcribes telephone calls and thus improves communication between customers and employees.
Social engagement is a leading priority at BCR Asigurări de Viaţă. The Romanian Group company regularly assists the Red Cross with its blood donation campaigns and has worked particularly closely with the organisation during the coronavirus pandemic. One example of BCR’s support was an initiative to set up a mobile Covid-19 vaccination centre for the people of Călărași district in the south of the country. The aim was to provide easy, unbureaucratic access to vaccinations. 1,700 people were vaccinated in the first three weeks alone. The centre visited 15 different communities and Red Cross volunteers were able to speak to over 5,000 people. BCR also provided support for the wide-ranging information campaign that accompanied the service.
Since 2016, the company has been cooperating with Ateliere Fără Frontiere, an organisation set up to help people from marginalised groups to access the labour market. In one of its projects, titled Edu Click, participants from the groups refurbish old computers as part of an employment and social reintegration programme. The refurbished PCs are made available to children from disadvantaged backgrounds so they could take part in online lessons. BCR Asigurări de Viaţă donated 100 old computers, which Edu Click distributed to eight different schools, putting smiles on the faces of some 1,200 pupils. The Bio & Co farm in Ciocănari in the county of Dâmbovița is another initiative which helps socially disadvantaged members of the community to find their feet – such as those affected by long-term unemployment or addiction problems. 24 BCR employees helped to put up a new fence at the farm, which sells home-grown organic vegetables, as part of the Social Active Day programme.
The company also supports good causes in the capital Bucharest, including covering the costs of vehicle insurance for a free transport service for disabled people. Unfortunately the service has now ceased operations.
BCR Asigurări de Viaţă showed off its green credentials by helping with the upkeep of hiking routes in the Brașov region, providing financial support as well as Social Active Day volunteers. The company is also a partner in an “adopt a tree” initiative which aims to expand woodlands in southern Romania. BCR’s involvement includes volunteering within the scope of the Social Active Day programme. The main focus of the project is planting belts of woodland that provide protection against extreme weather and improve agricultural output.
In its charitable work, Hungarian Group company UNION Biztosító places a special emphasis on forging long-term partnerships as well as supporting children and young people. It has been working with charities Nem Adom Fel Alapítvány (Never Give up Foundation) and KézenFogva Alapítvány (Hand in Hand Association) since 2016. Nem Adom Fel Alapítvány helps young people with disabilities to access the job market. Its work also includes providing childcare, meals and activity programmes for children who are suffering from poverty. A particular focus of UNION Biztosító’s partnership with the foundation is the Never Give up Café and Bar, where 90% of the staff have disabilities. The company also provides backing for the foundation’s centres and camps for young people with disabilities. KézenFogva Alapítvány runs trainee programmes and workshops designed to assist 15-24 year-olds who have special needs during the difficult transition between school and working life.
Established in 2001, the organisation Bátor Tábor works with seriously ill children and supports families who have suffered the loss of a child. It is part of the SeriousFun Childrenʼs Network set up by Paul Newman and throughout the year organises free therapeutic leisure-time activity programmes for children with serious illnesses. UNION Biztosító has been helping Bátor Tábor in a variety of ways for over 15 years now – providing Social Active Day programme volunteers for example.
The company also supports KórházSuli (Hospital School), a charity that helps children who have to spend long periods in hospital or at home with their school work. The teachers and trainee teachers who provide the tutoring are all volunteers.
On top of all this, UNION Biztosító has set up an internal ambassador programme. Its staff can apply to become ambassadors on issues that are particularly important to the company, such as CSR, health, diversity, climate change and animal welfare. The ambassadors are the faces of the programme and they have an impact that extends far beyond the intranet. The UNION Ambassadors are chosen in elections and serve for one year. Examples of the initiatives that they have organised include litter collecting on Budapest’s Gellért Hill, an employee bike tour, first aid training, visits to an animal shelter, and collecting donations of old clothes, books and toys for people in need.
On the right track
Owing to the large number of impressive entries in 2022, the decision was made for the first time in the history of the Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience to present additional prizes. They were awarded to other VIG Group companies who also did outstanding work in support of good causes that had a valuable impact in the community.
-
The recipients include Slovakian Group company Kooperativa, which set up its own foundation in 2020 and is committed to helping children and young people.
-
Wiener Osiguranje in Bosnia-Herzegovina also won one of the awards for its dedication to improving children’s lives. The company equipped 13 schools in 12 different towns and cities with a variety of educational materials as well as items of furniture. Its staff made a huge contribution to the initiative, with employees volunteering in a number of ways as part of the Social Active Day programme, for instance by painting classrooms.
-
Makedonja Osiguruvanje is a long-standing partner of the charity SOS Children’s Villages and also works with the organisation Project Happiness, whose activities across the country improve quality of life and open up educational and learning opportunities for disadvantaged children.
The aim of the three additional awards, which came with prize money of EUR 10,000 each, was to encourage the winners to keep up their good work. As with the main awards, the prize money must be earmarked for good causes, and is provided in its entirety by Wiener Städtische Versicherungsverein.
As in previous years, the 2021 award winners are characterized by outstanding social commitment:
Kilometre after Kilometre: staff at InterRisk in Poland get moving to help people in need
Polish Group company InterRisk is a long-standing supporter of social causes across the country. The company involves its employees in its CSR activities to the greatest possible extent, and the annual Charity Run held since 2014 is a good example. InterRisk employees raise money for every kilometre they cover in support of the social running event, with the proceeds donated to charities. Both participant numbers and the amount raised have increased steadily over the years. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, and with an eye on the wellbeing of all participants, the company decided not to stage the run in the usual format in 2020. Instead, employees took to the streets in 21 different towns and cities across Poland, either alone or in small groups, recording the distance they covered on an app. In total, they clocked up an impressive 2,228km, generating donations amounting to EUR 10,000. The money was split between eight organisations selected by InterRisk employees. The recipients included charities that support disadvantaged and sick children as well as victims of violence and sexual abuse, and an animal welfare organisation.
In addition, during the pandemic InterRisk has donated money and equipment such as sanitiser and masks to hospitals and care facilities.
The company plans to use the EUR 50,000 prize money for the 2021 Gold Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience to help finance two custom vehicles specially designed to transport donated blood.
Making the roads safer for children
The 2021 Silver Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience went to BTA Baltic in Latvia for its tireless work supporting young people and promoting road safety for children. In 2020 the company joined forces with the ‘We build Parks’ association to initiate the BTA Velomaster project (BTA Velozinis in Latvian), which designs unique cycling proficiency tracks for children and young people. With an emphasis on fun and enjoyment, the aim is to raise awareness of bike safety with a range of features that replicate an urban environment. In 2021, these innovative facilities were built in eight Latvian towns and cities. The respective local authorities provided the space for the tracks, while BTA Baltic funded the training elements on the Velomaster routes – aimed at youngsters of all ages, the BTA Velomaster tracks across Latvia feature more than 100 obstacles and other structures, covering a total area of around 1,000m2. The tracks include some of the most common road signs and markings, as well as obstacles that cyclists typically face in urban settings, such as potholes and different road surfaces.
In addition, for many years BTA Baltic has collaborated with Latvian World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) partner Pausales Dabas as well as the country’s nature conservation agency, a sign of its ongoing commitment to long-term environmental protection. The www.darudabai.lv website, which was launched with the support of BTA Baltic and other organisations, highlights the nature reserves that are particularly at risk and where help is needed to protect them. BTA employees are also keen supporters of the “Do for Nature” initiative as part of Social Active Day, and they rolled up their sleeves again in October 2020 – 80 employees cleaned up several kilometres of the Krimulda nature park and planted oak seedlings.
Swift, bureaucracy-free support for the most vulnerable members of society
The winner of the 2021 Bronze Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience was Wiener Osiguranje in Croatia, which was singled out for its rapid and highly efficient support for victims of the earthquake that struck the country in late 2020. The catastrophe caused huge damage – almost 90% of the buildings in the town of Petrinja were razed to the ground. The hospital in the port town of Sisak, where the Kupa and Sava rivers meet, was particularly badly affected. The members of Wiener Osiguranje’s Managing Board visited the hospital to see the damage for themselves, and also held talks with administrators to identify options for providing meaningful support. Wiener Osiguranje donated EUR 66,365 to the earthquake victims, with the majority of the money used to get the hospital in Sisak up and running again. But it is not just natural disasters like this that hit the weakest members of society particularly hard; the coronavirus pandemic has also had a huge impact. This is why the company chose to support a project entitled “Equal opportunities for all”: the initiative provides internet access for children from low-income families, as well as electronic equipment for home schooling – a total of 50 laptops were supplied – and weekly lessons focused on this topic for children.
Wiener Osiguranje also supports the organisation ‘Mali zmaj’, which is dedicated to improving quality of life for deprived children and those at risk of poverty; in one such example, the company has made office space available in central Zagreb for the charity to use free of charge. On Social Active Day, Wiener Osiguranje employees renovated and decorated the space to make it suitable for children. Besides arranging outings with sports and leisure activities for the children, ‘Mali zmaj’ also organises professional learning support and psychotherapy for youngsters who need it.
As in previous years, the 2020 award winners are characterized by outstanding social commitment:
Social commitment takes on many different forms at Omniasig
Omniasig from Romania was the winner of the 2020 Gold Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience. In 2019, the VIG Group company launched some new initiatives aimed at helping socially disadvantaged people in rural areas, with a focus on creating educational opportunities for future generations. The company carried out renovation work at a school in the village of Malu Roşu north of Bucharest, in collaboration with new partner World Vision Romania. Over 40 employees – including the Chairman and two other members of the Managing Board – used their Social Active Day to renovate 1,300m² of interior spaces, volunteering a total of around 500 working hours. The Group company enlisted the support of five of the country’s top influencers to help with social media publicity. This included asking the public to donate books to the school. Omniasig is also proud to support Global Money Week, an initiative to raise financial awareness among children, which is backed by the Romanian Ministry of Education and the country’s Financial Supervisory Authority. All of the partners share the goal of teaching children about money and finances. In 2019, Omniasig donated age-appropriate books and also bought textbooks for children in one of Bucharest’s most deprived neighbourhoods, who were delighted to receive over 200 school books. The company also collected money and donations of food, hygiene products and clothing for young people in disadvantaged areas for a food bank campaign. This was the fourth time that Omniasig had teamed up with the Romanian Red Cross to organise the collections, and the donations were delivered in person by the Managing Board Chairman and 30 employees. The Romanian Group company has also proved its green credentials with efforts such as the in-house Eco Pilots on 2 Wheels initiative. The scheme is all about encouraging staff to leave their cars at home and ride their bikes to work during the summer. 60 people took part, with a new bicycle going to the three employees who cycled to work most often. Since 2014, Omniasig has focused on minimising paper use and increasing recycling in many of its Bucharest offices. In 2019 alone, employees recycled 7,329 kilogrammes of paper and cardboard – saving the equivalent of about 110 trees. Every year staff also plant tree seedlings in the municipality of Cormarnic in the Greater Wallachia region as part of the Social Active Day programme. Omniasig launched the tree planting initiative in 2016 in cooperation with the state-owned forestry company Romsilva and the Tourism Association for Nature Oxygen, largely to curb the effects of illegal tree felling, which is a widespread problem in the country. In 2019, 42 Omniasig employees collected rubbish and waste along with 365,000 other volunteers across Romania for Let’s Do It, Romania!, the country’s largest volunteering organisation, which the company has been supporting for many years.
Exceptional kindness towards children and people with special needs
Encouraging children to stay healthy and active is particularly close to the hearts of staff at Komunálna in Slovakia. Launched in 2018, the company’s Sports Day in Kindergarten initiative was so well received that the company decided to expand the programme the following year. Eight kindergartens in locations across all of Slovakia’s administrative regions took part in the sports and recreational programme, which was specially designed by the VIG Group company for the target age groups. In the run-up, 77 Komunálna employees and the Managing Board members used their Social Active Day to carry out improvements at the kindergartens. These included various different activities, depending on the requirements of the individual kindergartens, ranging from painting and repairs to gardening and building work. Every year employees from Komunálna also visit facilities for children and young people in many of the country’s towns and cities to distribute gifts or play St. Nicholas at Christmas time. In addition to Sports Day in Kindergarten, Komunálna also assisted 161 other sports, cultural and social projects and initiatives throughout Slovakia in 2019. Oscars without Barriers is another project which received the company’s backing. These awards pay tribute to towns and districts that are leading the way when it comes to addressing the needs of people with disabilities and doing exemplary work in terms of disability inclusion. In this regard, Komunálna once again supported the TA3 Television Foundation’s charity fundraiser for people with special needs. Organised by the TA3 television station, the initiative took place for the sixth time. The Foundation’s Director, Peter Káčer, raised money by cycling hundreds of kilometres across Slovakia. His exceptional effort was a source of inspiration for people – like him – with disabilities. It also helped to publicise the fundraiser and increased public awareness of treatment options for people with special needs. Komunálna has been a partner of the organisation Children of Slovakia for many years and participates in its Child Friendly Community initiative. The main aim of this project is to create an environment for children and young people which promotes their social and community inclusion, and allows them to have their say in local authority activities that affect them. This is designed to encourage young families to remain in their home communities. Komunálna was presented with the 2020 Silver Günter Geyer Award for Social Conscience for its numerous charitable activities and support for humanitarian causes.
Highly productive partnership with the charity Powiślańskiej.
Vienna Life in Poland demonstrated its strong sense of social responsibility through activities such as its partnership with the volunteering charity Powiślańskiej (PFS). The NGO has been helping socially disadvantaged people for almost three decades, supporting groups such as deprived families, people with addiction problems and job seekers. In Warsaw’s Powiśle district, it runs preventive care and treatment programmes, two day centres for children and young people, and two family counselling centres. About 70 Vienna Life employees decided to spend their Social Active Day volunteering for the charity, helping out with activities such as dance and filmmaking workshops for children at the day centres. The children enjoyed the opportunity to try out a new leisure activity, with some of them discovering a passion for jazz dance, while the older ones were fascinated to see how a professional film production is put together and even got to feature in front of the camera, too. Vienna Life provided financial assistance for a three-week canoeing camp for the PFS day centre children on the river Wkra in summer 2019. During their stay, the youngsters also had the chance to talk to mental health professionals. Vienna Life staff were asked to show their sporting prowess for the initiative – the company’s funding for the camp was conditional on employees taking part in a sports and exercise competition titled Fit for the Holiday. And they smashed the target they were set of volunteering a minimum of 1,000 hours working with children from the day centres: about 50 employees spent over 1,600 hours – the equivalent of about 10 weeks – doing sports activities with the kids.
Building on its successful partnership with PFS, Vienna Life has launched the Zauważaj! (Pay Attention!) campaign. It is aimed at raising awareness of how we fail to notice the needs of others in the course of our busy lives – and that just a few small gestures can make a big difference. The project involved the production of a 20-minute documentary film, advertisements, and online and social media activities. The film ties together the lives of some of the day centre children, one of the centre’s tutors and a Vienna Life employee.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the company provided PFS with quick and efficient support that included purchasing sanitiser dispensers. Vienna Life also sprang into action when there was a fire at one of the day centres, quickly organising new furniture for the facility.
Important and the right thing
Not a question of if, but of what for. It goes without saying that we are committed to social projects. Because values and principles that we consider to be important and the right thing at VIG are also something that we want to promote outside the office. That is why our main shareholder, Wiener Städtische Versicherungsverein, and the Vienna Insurance Group support many initiatives, measures and campaigns.
