Ford of Europe: People

Our employees are crucial to delivering our vision of building great products that contribute to a better world.

Ford is dedicated to contributing to society and being actively involved in the communities at all of our sites globally. In Europe, we remain true to this corporate citizenship mindset and are proud of our long history of working to benefit society outside of just the vehicles we produce.

In 2000, Ford in Germany launched the Community Involvement Program, which connects Ford employees to opportunities for volunteering in the community. As of year-end 2012, nearly 10,000 Ford employees had volunteered through this program, working on some 1,260 projects and dedicating more than 160,000 working hours. In 2012 alone, we supported approximately 115 volunteering and community projects through this volunteering program. Specifically, 830 employees each contributed up to 16 hours of their time, funded by Ford, totaling 12,400 hours. We also provided five Ford Transit vans to support 86 additional community projects. The vans were driven a total of 73,000 km, which equates to 556 vehicle-days on the road.

Also in 2012, Ford of Europe volunteers went out into the community as part of the Ford Global Week of Caring:

In Belgium, for example, more than two dozen Ford volunteers went to work at a home for disabled children – painting, gardening and doing clean-up work.
In Romania, some 80 Ford volunteers helped to renovate the yard at Children’s Hospital Craiova. The hospital grounds were in poor condition, and Ford employees’ team effort created a cleaned-up and inviting site for the children to rest and play.
In Germany, approximately 70 Ford employees organized a charity art project to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of Ford’s cooperation with the city of Cologne, raising about €7,000 for the oncology ward of a children’s hospital. Employees of Ford and the city of Cologne jointly supervised the donation marathon.
In Spain, Ford Valencia employees removed floating debris from Albufera lake waters. Multiple teams of three to four employees used rowboats to access and pick up the trash, which tended to get stuck between the shore plants.
In the U.K., approximately 80 Ford volunteers were involved in various natural conservation activities to support the Essex Wildlife Trust, a long-standing collaboration to protect wildlife.

In Germany in early 2013, Ford received an “Engagement of the Year 2012” award from the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. This award honors Ford’s Community Involvement Program in Germany as a role model for corporate citizenship. The prize money was donated to the nonprofit school project Gandhi Award in Cologne, which aims to foster and reward diversity at schools, conflict management and volunteering. Ford actively supports Gandhi Award activities.

See the Investing in Communities section for a full list of our Global Week of Caring and other volunteerism efforts conducted by Ford in Europe and elsewhere. For a discussion of our global commitment to our stakeholders please see the People section.

830 employees each contributed up to 16 hours of their time, totaling 12,400 volunteer hours