Woodside Petroleum fell below its targeted spend on social investment programs last year, despite more than $9 million flowing to the communities in which it operates.
Woodside Petroleum fell below its targeted spend on social investment programs last year, despite more than $9 million flowing to the communities in which it operates.
The company’s $9.12 million investment was about $1 million below what it had hoped to allocate during the 12 months to the end of December 2013.
About $7.6 million of the money or in-kind payment was spent in Western Australia. Youth and education, health and arts and culture accounted for 67 per cent of the total funding.
With 5,400 hours of voluntary work added to the direct monetary investment, the value of Woodside’s social contribution rose to $10.1 million ($8.4 million in WA).
Programs in the Pilbara, where Woodside operates the North West Shelf Venture, made up 19 per cent of social investment expenditure.
The company has invested in community projects such as the new St John Ambulance centre in Roebourne.
It also re-established the Shire of Roebourne Community Liaison Group to facilitate communication with the community.
In 2011, Woodside’s social investment was $7.7 million. That increased to $9.5 million in 2012.
The total amount invested during 2013 equated to 0.35 per cent of the company’s before-tax profit for the year, which was about $2.9 billion.
Woodside’s target was to invest 0.40 per cent of its pre-tax profit in community programs which, if achieved, would have taken the total to $11.1 million.
The company is hoping the establishment of the $20 million Woodside Development Fund will help it reach its new target of 0.45 per cent of profit before tax in 2014 and 0.5 per cent in 2015.
The fund will operate over 10 years to support programs and organisations focused on early childhood development.
Another of Woodside’s corporate social responsibility targets was to improve communication with affected communities, which it is aiming to do through the launch of an online forum Canvas, currently in the testing phase.
It also wanted to double the membership of its Reconciliation Interest Group from the 195 members at the end of 2012. It failed on that target, however, with 53 people withdrawing membership during the year from the group, which offers Woodside staff an opportunity to become more involved in the company’s reconciliation programs.
