As it expands its business activities worldwide, the NGK Group also conducts a wide variety of activities as a corporate citizen in the communities in which it does business.
Social Contributions and Initiatives With Communities
The NGK Group works to promote social contribution activities in partnership with local communities, aligned with the needs and characteristics of the communities in which each of our companies is located. These activities center around people and education, environmental preservation, and community involvement. Our goal is to become a trusted corporate citizen in each of those communities.
Foreign students help clean up the local
community (May 2010)
In fields related to people and education, the NGK Group develops activities centered on supporting foreign students studying in Japan, with the goal of helping develop human resources who will contribute to the development of international society. In fiscal 2010, students receiving assistance actively participated in community clean-up programs. In addition, these students took part in crosscultural exchange meetings, which have become an established forum for these students to interact with locals, and continued to off er foreign language classes.
In fields related to environmental preservation, NGK visited local elementary schools to give classes on the theme of water, and conducted other wide-ranging activities. Examples included purchasing green power, and participating in the Lights Down Campaign for reducing CO2 emissions.
In fields related to community involvement, NGK holds a summer festival to which local residents are invited, as well as sponsors and supports sports festivals and participates in local clean-up campaigns, among other activities.
NGK works to create an environment in which employees can participate in and experience volunteer activities.
NGK employees have been taking part in the “Table for Two” (TFT) program since September 2010. Under this program, employees can choose from a menu of items at staff cafeterias that will help to improve their health, with ¥20 from each meal donated to provide a meal for a child in Africa. In fiscal 2010, the equivalent of approximately 6,800 meals were donated in the half year the program ran. Since this program was introduced, NGK has used various means such as the in-house newsletter, promotional videos and photo exhibitions to elicit employee understanding of TFT. Various TFT Menu (Healthy Box) activities are planned to entrench and stimulate participation in this program, including staging a food tasting event at which employees can try the mealsthey help provide for African children.
TFT Menu
(Healthy Box)
Atsuta Cafeteria, Headquarters
(September 2010)
Mizuho Cafeteria, Headquarters
(October 2010)
its intranet about events and volunteer programs staged by OISCA-International, a public interest incorporated foundation that conducts a broad range of activities in Japan and overseas, including developing farming communities and preserving the environment. In fiscal 2010, approximately 30 projects were introduced to employees, including a volunteer tree-planting program and an event related to COP10, the 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity. One of these projects saw actual involvement by NGK employees. While continuing to provide information, NGK will create opportunities for employees to participate in and experience activities by gauging their needs in this area.
In November 2010, nine employee volunteers from NGK Okhotsk (Abashiri, Hokkaido Prefecture) took part in an activity run by the Lake Abashiri, Mizu to Midori no Kai to enhance and clean up the colonies of skunk cabbages at Abashiri Lakeside. Along with other volunteers, the employees collected and laid out dead branches and grass so that water would pool inside the colonies, and also picked up rubbish.
Employees of Ikebukuro Horo Kogyo
(Tokorozawa, Saitama Prefecture) cleared weeds from beside a school route used by elementary school students in September 2010. To make the path safer, weeds are cleared at the end of the summer holidays every year because they become overgrown and encroach on the path. Volunteers weeded an approximate 100-meter stretch of pathway this year, filling bags with around 50 kilograms of weeds.
In September 2010, NGK Yu-Service Co., Ltd. (Mizuho, Nagoya), which runs the NGK staff cafeteria, accepted trainee kitchen hands from Aichi Mizuho Junior College. The students, who are majoring in diet and nutrition, must undertake practical training away from the college as part of their course. For a period of one week, they gained hands-on experience preparing meals in the staff cafeteria.
Energy Support (Inuyama, Aichi Prefecture) in October 2010 held a bicycle class for local kindergarteners and schoolchildren together with two neighboring companies. With the help also of Honda Motor Co., Ltd. and the Inuyama Police, Energy Support instructed 21 children on how to inspect and adjust their bicycles and to ride safely at intersections, among other advice.
In February 2011, 45 employees of Soshin Electric (Minato-ku, Tokyo) group companies Soshin Powertech Co., Ltd. (Miyakonojo, Miyazaki Prefecture) and Soshin Device Co., Ltd. (Miyazaki, Miyazaki Prefecture) cleared around 1 cm of volcanic ash from the eruption of Mount Shinmoe from the roads around company premises to stop it from being blown around by the wind. The employees removed some 30 tons of volcanic ash.
NGK Ceramics South Africa donated 100,000 rand (approximately ¥1.16 million) to 2 NPOs that are providing instruction on organic farming, and conducting healthcare and educational activities, respectively, in South Africa with the goal of helping local residents achieve greater independence. The donations were made at a ceremony held in October 2010 to commemorate the company’s 10th anniversary.
NGK wishes to off er its sincere sympathies to those aff ected by the Great East Japan Earthquake that struck on March 11, 2011. NGK hopes that the disaster-hit regions are able to achieve a swift recovery.
Fortunately, no NGK Group employees were killed or injured in the natural disaster, and our production lines were not badly aff ected. In the wake of the earthquake and tsunami, the NGK Group worked cohesively to produce and supply insulators and other products to help restore power facilities, an important lifeline. Furthermore, in order to provide relief to those aff ected and help with restoration eff orts in the disaster-stricken areas, the NGK Group made a monetary donation of approximately ¥100 million through the Japanese Red Cross Society.
NGK initiated a number of measures to reduce electricity consumption on weekdays during the 2011 summer in Japan. These included changing company non-work days during the three-month period from July through September, and introducing NAS (sodium-sulfur) batteries.
NAS batteries at the Nagoya Site
Production divisions will operate on Saturdays and Sundays from July 1 through September 30, shifting days off to Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Production divisions also took summer holidays for nine straight days from August 2 to August 10. Schedules for summer vacations other than the above were set by each production division.
By introducing NAS batteries at the Nagoya Site (Mizuho, Nagoya), the Chita Site (Handa, Aichi Prefecture) and the Komaki Site (Komaki, Aichi Prefecture), NGK plans to increase its own electrical storage capacity to 8,000 kW in total, including existing capacity. Capable of storing large amounts of electricity, these batteries are charged at night when electricity demand is low, and discharged during the day, thereby reducing peak electricity consumption.
NGK has implemented a range of measures to save power, including suspending the use of some elevators, removing lights, setting air-conditioning at 28 degrees Celsius, adjusting brightness on PCs and other electronic displays, turning off PCs during breaks and when away from desks. NGK also began encouraging employees to wear light summer business attire from May 16, two weeks earlier than normal.
