According to the action plan signed by the Chamber’s bureau under decree number 728/2014

the follow up of actions taken during May and June 2014 is displayed as follows: 

 

Task: Hold meetings between the Chief executive and the employees (Transparency principle) :

 

The Chief executive held the following meeting during the months May and June:

·     A meeting with the department of planning/follow up on 12/5/2014.

·     A meeting with both the departments of information and fee collection on 14/5/2014.

·     A meeting with the team charged with updating the traders’ credentials in the presence of the

      Chamber’s general secretary on 15/5/2014, 20/5/2014 and 25/5/2014.

·     A meeting to welcome the newly appointed employees with a number of the ISO committee members

      present on 22/6/2014.

·    A meeting with commercial/economical sector, financial/administrative sector and the employees

    operating in the Retailers academy, the Excellence center and the health care departments on 25/6/2014.

·    A meeting with public relations and the website departments in the presence of the Chamber’s general

     secretary on 26/6/2014.

·   Also attended the meeting between the chairman, the heads of sectors, the general managers and

    department managers on 30/6/2014.

 

Task: : Inviting the Chief executive, heads of sectors and the head of the union committee to the

board meetings (Transparency principle) :

 

·    No meetings were held during May.

·   During June two urgent meetings were held on 15/5/2014 and 23/6/2014 regarding the reassigning of

     tasks between the board members and thus only the cheif executive was invited to attend since the

    subject matter of discussion was a specific topic unrelated to the employees or traders.

 

Task: Publishing the charter of honor in the frame of the social responsibility

(Implementation of the social responsibility principle) :

 

·  5000 copies of the charter were published in Arabic and distributed through different departments

   such as the public relations and the excellence center.

·  Also the copies were distributed in the fairs the Chamber took part in, such as the poultry fair (5-7 June) and the Inter build fair (12-16 June) in both fairs 500 copies were distributed making the total distributed 1000 copies to date.

· The committee discussed the importance of publishing 1000 copies of the charter in English during 

its meeting on 24/6/2014.

 

Task: Publishing a worksheet defining the standards of ethical behavior and values to be used as guidelines for the employees’ behavior (Ethical behavior):

 

·         The memo was published and all employees were notified of it during June 2014.

 

Task: Digital archiving of the traders’ credentials in the certificates department (Consumer rights) :

 

·  The certificates department charged with this task forwarded a memo detailing the hardships hindering the needed modifications given that the department has been dealing with this challenge since 2011, on top of these hardships is the lack of resources made available such as computers and personnel.

 

Task: The performance and quality assessment committee (Accountability) :

 

·         The committee held its meetings on 7/5/2014 and 21/5/2014.

 

Task: Holding the connexion council meetings (respect for the stakeholders’ interests) :

·         The meeting was held in the presence of the heads of trade branches and the board on 22/5/2014.

 

Task: Enacting regulations for the new appointments (Fair operating practices) :

·         The regulations put forth were accepted by the ISO committee and after applying a few modifications and the Chamber’s legal consultant is currently drawing the form.

 

Task: Designing a survey questionnaire for the traders to evalute the degree of their satisfaction with the services offered by the Chamber (Consumer issues principle) :

 

·         The mentioned questionnaire had been confirmed by the ISO committee after applying a few modifications in the meeting held on 24/6/2014, and a memo was forwarded to the chairman detailing the matter and asking for permission to upload it to the Chamber’s website.

Task: Signing a contract with Janitorial/cleaning service/environmental protection company (Main subject: Environment) :

·         The contract was finalized in accordance with the regulations and standards put forth by the ISO committee.

 

Task: Holding educational sessions and conferences to raise the traders’ awareness of the social responsibility aims in relation to the commercial community (Implementing social responsibility principle) :

·       The ISO committee picked 8 of the Chamber’s employees capable of handling this task and the conferences are to begin next August.

 

Task: Creating a call center and offering the traders a hotline service (Consumer issues) :

 

·     The public relations department forwarded a memo to the supplies department, to which the latter replied that this task requires a large area unavailable to the Chamber at this point and the task is to be assigned to one of the companies specialized in this line of services.

 

Task: Ethical behavior courses for the Chamber’s employees (Ethical behavior)

·    The Retailers Academy of the Chamber held the training sessions involving 44 of the Chamber’s employees in the field of team work and building a team during May, and 21 employees in the field of intellectual quality during June.

 

Task: Contracting with a private health care service provider for the Chamber’s employees (Health) :

 

·  Mr. Gamal Hamour and Mrs. Randa Tawfik -members of the committee- reported that after surveying the companies in this field, contracting such a company is quite expensive that it will require payments that could impose rather a huge load on the Chamber’s employees and the Chamber currently does not possess the funds to pump into this project.

 

Task: Modifying the Chamber’s functional structure – job descriptions and adding new jobs for the employees (Labor practices) :

·  A committee is being assembled to handle the task.

 

Task: Offering educational and training courses for the traders periodically (Consumer services and settling of disputes between stakeholders) :

·         The Retailers academy held training courses in the fields of; managerial and leadership skills, TOT, English language and exporting courses for the traders and their employees. A number of 99 trainees received the training during May and another 54 during June.

 

Besides the general tasks handled by the ISO committee, we shall briefly point out a few improvements as follows :

 

Ø  The head of the ISO committee published a banner about the social responsibility and placed at the Chamber’s entrance.

Ø  The grocers’ trade branch held a seminar titled “The vitality of having an organization inspecting the edible materials” in association with Ain institute, the Consumer protection center and the National Organization of standardization and quality on 11/5/2014.

Ø  The Chamber held a seminar to raise “The rationalization of energy consumption” awareness in association with Ain institute, the small business fund institute and GEF on 24/6/2014.

Ø  A seminar about the environment titled “Waste disposal and separation of garbage” was held in the Chamber.

Ø  A memo was signed regarding the use of the Global Compact logo on the Chamber’s brochures.

Ø  A memo was signed regarding printing the website address on all outgoing letters, publishing and correspondences.

                                                                               Head of the ISO committee - Mrs. Akeelah Hegab