Business Partners for Development (BPD)
The major oil, gas and mining corporations of the world increasingly operate in regions characterised by poor communities and fragile environments. More effective use of external relationships to ensure the visible contribution of these investments to poverty reduction and local environmental management is critical. Those companies that successfully develop their relationships to this end build a competitive and reputational advantage, both locally and globally. Developing good external relationships with communities, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), public authorities and international aid agencies is not new. What is new is strengthening these relationships to the point where organisations drawn from across the three sectors of society – business, government, civil society - ‘pool’ their complementary resources, knowledge and skills to jointly address complex social problems. This is the concept of tri-sector partnerships: a voluntary collaboration to promote sustainable development based on an efficient allocation of complementary resources across business, civil society and government. Tri-sector partnerships offer something more than conventional public relations or stakeholder consultation. Whilst these activities can improve a company’s image, they do not necessarily lead to collaborative action. ‘Pooling’ resources signals a commitment to go beyond consultation and dialogue and do something practical, together.
