GE cares for the environment

There is more to business than sales and profits. At General Electric (GE), there are more than 131 GE Volunteer Councils located in more than 38 countries worldwide, each responsible for addressing serious social issues facing their communities. GE employees volunteer over 1 million of hours of community service yearly in over 1,000 service projects, and benefiting the lives of thousands of people. Through participation in various community projects in their respective countries, the GE volunteers are able to contribute their time, their talent, their knowledge and their money – but most of all, their hearts – helping people who need them most.

“In the Philippines, GE Volunteers continuously promote the spirit of volunteerism by recurrently engaging our colleagues as mentors and tutors to underprivileged schoolchildren, as builders of houses for low-income families, speakers at university lecture series, and as friends to the sick and the elderly, among others; thus, making a difference in the lives of many. Every employee at GE is automatically a GE Volunteer,” according to Jodi Gayatin, chairman for GE Volunteers Philippines.

GE volunteers Philippines engage in other worthy programs such as regular bloodletting activities conducted at the GE headquarters located at The Fort, and at the GE Money Servicing facility in Alabang, school supplies donation to various public schools and streets children, beach clean-up and eco race. Last year, GE Volunteers in the Philippines was awarded the GE Volunteer Impact Award in the category of Global Community Day. The award was for the “La Mesa Watershed Tree Planting” projects with GE volunteers logging in a total of 2,000 hours.

Recently, GE employees headed to Morong, Bataan for the “Bantay Pawikan Turtle Hatching Release Project”, a program that promotes the protection of our natural resources. Relatively, employees are also busy collecting old newspapers, magazine, used paper and ink cartridges, as part of collecting recyclable waste go the GE Volunteers fund to help finance other worthy charitable projects.

Colin Low, GE President for Philippines, Singapore and Cambodia, is proud of the GE Volunteers team in the Philippines. “Our workforce in the country comprise of around 1,300 employees, and most are very young, and therefore, are very energetic, driven and can be very passionate especially in donating their time for worthy causes, “he says. “Volunteerism has been an integral p art of GE’s culture fore more than a century, as both an individual employee activity, as well as an organizational effort”