To coincide with International Volunteer Day, on Sunday 5 December, abertis has today held its second Corporate Volunteer Day, this year focused on raising disability awareness among the Group’s workers. The day, which this time round has the slogan “Another way of doing things”, forms part of the Corporate Volunteer programme, Voluntaris, which the company has been carrying out since 2009.

The main activities of the Volunteer Day are taking place at abertis‘ corporate headquarters in Barcelona, situated in the Zona Franca Logistics Park, where 1,100 employees are based.

This morning, the day included an institutional session participated in by Àngels Guiteras, President of the Taula d’Entitats Tercer Sector Social de Catalunya, who offered a conference on “Volunteer work and society in the future”, and Ramón Giró, Director of the Seeliger & Conde Foundation, who took an in-depth look at “Disability and the employment world: myths and realities”. Also in attendance were Salvador Alemany, President of abertis, and Francisco Reynés, the Managing Director.

During this event, members of Voluntaris have launched the Teaming project, which will promote among workers the donation of €1 a month to social initiatives.

Donations to charity projects

Meanwhile, the abertis foundation has announced the donation of a total of €40,000 to five charity initiatives, which have been selected following a vote by the Group’s employees on the corporate Intranet.

The Foundation will thus set aside €10,000 to each of the winning projects in the different categories: in the environmental field, to the management and restoration of the habitat of the Iberian river crab in the basin of the River Llobregat, promoted by the Associació de Defensa i Estudi de la Fauna i Flora Autòctona; in the cultural field, to the Agima association, for the development of a travelling exhibition to disseminate the role of women throughout history in Catalonia; and in the social field, to the Flores del Ganges Association, which promotes medical and welfare assistance for women from Varanasi who suffer domestic violence and social exclusion.

In addition, the abertis foundation will award another €5,000 each to the Theodora Foundation, which organises visits by the so-called “Smile Doctors” to children in hospital, and to the Associació Persones amb Discapacitat Intel·lectual (FAREM), with its project to offer leisure activities to disabled people.

Activities in Spain and Chile

Activities have been organised in the Group’s various headquarters in Spain throughout the day. At the Logistics Park headquarters a charity fair has been set up, where various associations and foundations have put on sale products made in their special work centres, which are mostly made up of disabled people. Organisations such as the Gaspar de Portolà Private Foundation, Teixidors, Fundació Auxilia, Gymm, CET El Pla, the Bogatell Occupational Centre, Atam and Aprodisca have taken part in this initiative.

For its part, the Disability Awareness Raising Association has organised the “Live the experience” workshop to allow employees to experience the difficulties faced by disabled people when carrying out their daily tasks.

Tomorrow, a craftwork and painting exhibition will be organised by the APADEFIM-Personas Foundation at the iberpistas Operations and Control Centre in San Rafael (Segovia), as well as an introductory workshop to blindness and visual impairment, in collaboration with the ONCE Foundation.

With the Christmas holidays approaching, the collection of food and clothing is being promoted in more than 20 of the Group’s centres in the Valencia region, Castilla-León, Catalonia, the Basque Country, the Canary Islands, Andalusia, Madrid, Asturias, Galicia and Aragón. Toy collection points have also been set up in Madrid. In the international field, abertis‘ offices in Chile have also set up clothing and food collection points.

Corporate Volunteer Programme

Voluntaris, abertis‘ Corporate Volunteer Programme, represents another step in the process of the company’s involvement in the community and the social fabric, a commitment which forms part of abertis‘ Strategic Social Responsibility Plan .

Through this initiative, promoted by a group of company workers, abertis provides its employees with a framework in which to develop volunteer activities in their free time, using for this purpose communication and dissemination tools such as the corporate Intranet and the internal communication channels of the various Group companies.

Through the corporate Intranet, this initiative reaches around 5,000 Group employees, whilst around 6,000 abertis workers in Spain are reached through the business units’ own communication channels.