Social and Ethics Committee report
Our commitment to ESG performance provides a strong competitive advantage by entrenching responsible and resource-efficient practices, supporting diverse thinking and positioning the Group as a responsible corporate citizen.
%20Komape%20Maditse.png)
Alex Maditse
Chairman
Attendance and composition
The Companies Second Amendment Act, 17 of 2024, is now in force with effect from 27 December 2024. This means that members of the Social and Ethics Committee of a listed company must be elected by the shareholders at the AGM, as opposed to being appointed by the Board.
Members
- AK Maditse (Chairman) (3/3)
- DP Hele (3/3)
- N Halamandaris (3/3)
- BS Mathe (3/3)
- WP Mzimba (3/3)
Invitees
- Group HR Executive
- Group Executive Supply Chain
- Group Risk Executive
- Group Transformation Manager
- Company Secretary
- Group Financial Director
Relevant skills profile of members
Committee members are highly skilled in governance, risk, law and sustainability reporting.
Oversight areas
Focus areas for 2025
The Committee and the Social and Ethics Working Group worked on the following matters:
Governance and compliance
- Approved the Legal and Regulatory Compliance Framework.
- Noted the implementation of the GRC tool to improve compliance across the Group.
- Monitored POPIA compliance and increased POPIA awareness among employees and actions to improve consumer data protection compliance in other markets.
- Monitored the Group’s compliance with the Extended Producer Responsibility legislation.
Human capital and employment equity
- Reviewed and reported to the Board on the Group’s employment equity performance relative to the Group Employment Equity Plan, which was set out in the annual Employee Equity Report submitted to the Department of Labour.
- Monitored the progress of ethics training across the Group.
- Whistle-blowing cases monitored and investigated.
- Noted results of the annual employee survey (Voice your View).
Preferential procurement
- Oversaw implementation of the Group’s transformation strategy, including enterprise and supplier development projects and preferential procurement.
- Reviewed and reported to the Board on the Group’s detailed B-BBEE strategy, targets and budget, and progress made aligned to the scorecard.
Community development and CSI
Implementing our ESG framework
We tracked the Group’s implementation of the ESG Framework, developed in 2024, and its performance against its selected SDG targets. The ESG Framework, which tracks our contributions to three primary SDGs and three secondary SDGs, is appropriate for the business and focuses our attention on the major ESG themes of environmental sustainability, social responsibility and corporate governance. As a Committee, we take a proactive rather than reactive approach and challenge management to think deeply about sustainability issues.
Environmental sustainability
We are pleased with the performance against our environmental targets and have successful strategies in place to reduce our energy consumption, manage food waste and favour more environmentally friendly packaging. Reducing our water usage, particularly at water-intensive facilities, remains a significant challenge. This is largely due to the high capex requirements for water recycling projects. At all our plants, we encourage the implementation of water monitoring and usage practices and initiatives to foster a culture of water conservation. We encourage management to consider the Group’s contribution towards net zero and set appropriate GHG emissions reduction targets.
Social responsibility
Social responsibility at Famous Brands focuses on transformation, CSI and health and safety practices. We are pleased with our transformation performance and the achievement of a Level 1 B‑BBEE status. This marks the culmination of years of progress and various approaches to address the different pillars of the B‑BBEE scorecard. We are particularly proud of our support of Black-owned businesses and the procurement projects we developed over the past year.
Our CSI initiatives are closely tied to our brands and have a positive impact on the community through long-term partnerships with CSI partners. The Committee is guiding management to consider practices to better measure and understand the impact of our activities and tell a holistic Famous Brands community impact story.
The Group is dedicated to maintaining the highest standards of health and safety across all operations to protect our employees, customers and other stakeholders. In 2024, the Committee monitored the adherence to health and safety protocols and initiatives to foster a culture of safety awareness. We strive to strengthen our focus on leading indicators because they provide a proactive and predictive view of safety performance, enabling the identification of issues before they result in incidents. The Committee monitored performance against 11 leading indicators, our near-miss reporting system, and the refurbishment of the Lamberts Bay Foods plant to address health and safety issues related to ageing infrastructure. The working conditions at the plant are now considered satisfactory. We also noted improvements in health and safety, thanks to a dedicated role created to oversee this area.
