In December 2004 the Asian tsunami devastated coastal communities around the Indian Ocean; in September the hurricane season saw Katrina bring death and hardship to the southern United States; and in October the south Asian earthquake killed many thousands and made millions more homeless. Each of these natural disasters affected countries where BOC and its employees earn their living. Thankfully all our employees and their immediate families survived these disasters and the local BOC businesses and the global community of BOC combined to do what they could in the aftermath. BOC’s matched-giving schemes ensured that employee donations counted for more, amounting to over £570,000 in total for the victims of the tsunami. The response of local teams was epitomised by BOC Pakistan: the company gave money and emergency material and three days’ paid leave for every employee to help in the earthquake relief effort and the employees themselves gave two days’ pay to the relief fund having already, like their colleagues in Bangladesh, given one day’s pay to the tsunami relief efforts. If examples were needed, these disasters show one aspect of the role of business in communities and of the innate generosity of people confronted by others’ misery. BOC makes a contribution to the economies where it works in many ways. It provides essential products to industry and commerce and a livelihood for its employees, while striving to make the work environment as safe as possible. It delivers technologies that minimise some of the potentially harmful environmental effects of economic development while doing what it can to reduce its own emissions and waste. And it supports worthwhile projects that reflect the character of its business and the wishes of its employees. Safety is the number one priority in BOC. It has traditionally been measured by counting the number and severity of incidents and injuries. We continue to measure these and to see an improvement in performance. Now we also measure and report leading indicators of safety – things that, if we get them right, will have an impact on safety in the future, such as training, the speed of rectifying faults, and the quality of investigations into incidents. It is unacceptable that anyone is hurt in the course of us doing our business, which is why we concentrate on making safety 100 per cent of our behaviour, 100 per cent of the time. In Australia our business there has built on BOC’s own commitment to safety by sponsoring the Rotary Youth Driver Awareness road safety programme. Young drivers in their last years at school are helped to understand the dangers of driving. In the words of one attendee the course “is a very important step in educating young drivers and making them safer when behind the wheel of a car”. BOC operates in a hazardous industry, which is why safety is the priority, but we need to manage a range of other social, environmental and ethical risks. Our Code of Conduct was launched three years ago and is now established in all our businesses. The challenge now is to make sure it is sustained and we have a programme to do this. We have a help line that is available, free of charge, in 49 countries. Employees can speak to an independent organisation, anonymously if they wish, and raise any concerns they may have. Our employee policies and procedures are aligned with the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights and we have signed the UN’s Global Compact and incorporated its ten principles in the BOC Code of Conduct. For the first time this year the regular Voice of BOC survey was sent to every employee in the Group, either electronically or on paper. Some 68 per cent responded, which is a very high level for such surveys, and they told us we were doing well on safety, employee well-being, the Code of Conduct, performance reviews, collaboration and diversity but needed to focus more on customers and engage employees more. Again this year BOC participated in Business in the Community’s (BiTC) corporate responsibility index. The completed qualifying questionnaire has grown to over 130 pages, making it one of the most comprehensive analyses of an organisation’s performance. We publish the completed questionnaire, together with BiTC’s assessment of our performance, on boc.com. This is the most transparent way of reporting what we do and more efficient than answering a multiplicity of bespoke questionnaires. Industrial gases have many environmentally friendly applications. Using oxygen instead of air in many combustion processes reduces the levels of harmful emissions. BOC is already helping deliver cleaner fuels today through the use of hydrogen in oil refining and it is investing in hydrogen technology that holds the promise of a more environmentally friendly future. Its partnerships include a trial project that combines solar power and hydrogen fuel cell technology for water management systems in the UK, the development of hydrogen systems to power forklift trucks operating in north American warehouses, and a prototype hydrogen powered sports car whose only emission is water. Elsewhere, BOC has combined with Australia’s research organisation CSIRO to develop an environmentally safe fumigant to replace methyl bromide in agriculture. The BOC Foundation continues to fund environmentally promising technologies. It seeks projects involving air and water quality that are beyond the early research phase but need help getting to the stage where they can be widely adopted and applied. In New Zealand, BOC’s ‘Where There’s Water’ community environment grants programme has now been running for three years; this year most of its grants went to schools running water conservation projects. Schools and education are supported by BOC through our Inspiring Gases programme run in co-operation with the Royal Society of Chemistry. Helping young people develop an interest in science, and in chemistry in particular, is important for our business and for our wider economic welfare. Chemistry can be fun and this year BOC supported the Institution of Chemical Engineers’ seventh world congress in Glasgow by staging a spectacular show called ‘It’s a Gas’ at the Glasgow Science Centre which, not surprisingly, used bangs, pops, flames and vapour clouds to show the properties of gases to young audiences.

Safety training in the south Pacific. BOC supports the Rotary Youth Driver Awareness programme in Australia. BOC sells a range of environmentally-friendly refrigerants. BOC helps fund the Salter’s festival of chemistry at the University of Surrey in the UK. Art from employees and their children features in the BOC safety calendar. ‘Where There’s Water’ funds school projects in New Zealand. BOC Singapore employees pack tsunami relief aid.