/PRNewswire/ --
* Ford is collaborating with Georgia Tech and George Washington University on sustainability projects involving water consumption and human rights
* The Georgia Tech project helps Ford deliver on its company-wide commitment to reduce its global water usage
* Ford collaborates with George Washington University on human rights issues as the company looks to expand its global operations
Ford (NYSE: F) is collaborating with two universities on separate sustainability projects, seeking to increase the company's knowledge on water consumption and human rights, two key issues in its global operations.
Working with Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) in Atlanta, Ford is continuing to develop innovative processes that will enable the company to maintain its commitment to reducing global water usage. From 2000 to 2008, Ford reduced its global water use by 56 percent – or 9.5 billion gallons – as part of its goal to minimize the environmental impact of its facilities around the world. Economic development experts have stressed that water scarcity is quickly becoming a high-priority global issue and Ford is addressing the issue as part of its broad global sustainability program to reduce its environmental footprint.
Ford also is working with George Washington University in Washington, D.C. on human rights issues in markets where the company is looking to expand its global operations. George Washington is helping Ford determine the best business strategies for working with governments and other businesses in developing countries where raw materials are being collected for use in vehicle technology components.
"Sustainability isn't just about the environment," said David Berdish, manager of social sustainability for Ford. "A company that is truly concerned about sustainability is concerned about its entire global impact – environmental, social and economic. Working with academics helps us broaden our perspective and move forward as responsible corporate citizens."
About the water project
The collaboration with Georgia Tech's Sustainable Design and Manufacturing program will help Ford determine the right manufacturing processes as its base expands into water-scarce areas like China, South Africa and Mexico, Berdish said.
"We have a lot of good processes – some of them best in class – on how we manage our facilities for water usage and water quality," he said. "Ford's long-term success is dependent on thriving communities and ecosystems, both of which require water. So Georgia Tech is helping us research the environmental issues surrounding the life cycle of our vehicles, including the use of water in the manufacturing process."
It's an exercise steeped not only in academics but in real-world benefits," said Tina Guldberg, associate director of corporate programs for Georgia Tech's Sustainable Design and Manufacturing program. "This is a project that transfers knowledge and works on delivering long-term sustainability for the real world," she said.
The work to reduce water usage builds on the university's existing relationship with Ford, adds Burt Bras, professor of mechanical engineering. "We've had a long and fruitful relationship with Ford," he said. "Projects like this provide great opportunities for students and faculty to be involved in multidisciplinary research and learn firsthand how such industry-academia collaborations are crucial in advancing sustainable development."
About the human rights project
Ford has long worked to be a responsible corporate citizen around the globe. Building on those efforts, Ford is now collaborating with George Washington's Institute for Corporate Responsibility on human rights.
"We're the only company in our industry that publicly reports a human rights code," said Berdish. "We've established a leadership position, and external stakeholders are looking to Ford as a role model."
Emerging human rights issues can pose new challenges. For example, raw materials used in new automotive technologies are found in unstable countries, and these "conflict minerals" may create unexamined human rights issues. George Washington, Berdish said, is helping Ford develop a corporate ethics strategy that will allow the company to maintain its high standards for upholding human rights within its supply chain.
"As strategic sourcing has become a priority issue for corporations, concerns over fresh water and also raw materials from conflict regions should be addressed collaboratively by governments, corporations, international organizations and society," said John Forrer, associate director of the university's Institute for Corporate Responsibility.
"The concept of a 'trusted partner' puts companies in a proactive position, addressing issues and concerns alongside these external stakeholders and making decisions that take into account the interests of the communities in which they operate," Forrer said. "Our research will help Ford understand the strategies, policies and practices it takes to be a trusted corporate partner operating in a complex global market."
Both projects will increase in importance as Ford continues its worldwide expansion.
"These are big-picture projects," Berdish said. "It's important we all work together to identify emerging trends around science, technology and policy. We need to understand where we fit in to understand the impact of our global presence."
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Showing posts with label georgia tech. Show all posts
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Thursday, October 14, 2010
Friday, November 20, 2009
Georgia Tech Challenges University of Georgia to a Food Fight
Georgia Tech’s Community Service Council and Student Government Association are challenging the University of Georgia to a food fight. The second annual GT vs. UGA food fight collects canned goods on behalf of the Atlanta Community and Northeast Georgia Food Banks.
“Tech has never turned down a challenge from U(sic)GA,” said Rob Parrish, a student organizer for the event. Last year, Georgia Tech collected one barrel of cans, approximately 300 pounds. The University of Georgia collected more than 20,000 pounds of cans. “We are hoping for ten full barrels of cans,” said Parrish
“I know we are going to win the game on Saturday. It is my sincere hope that we can do almost as well with this challenge,” said Parrish. “Georgia Tech’s motto is Progress and Service, and we must not forget the second part of that.”
Members of the Georgia Tech community may donate canned items through November 25 (by 5:00 p.m.). Blue collection bins are located near the library fountain, next to the Student Government Office in the Student Center, and in the Athletic Association. Large donations or questions about donations should be directed to Parrish at robparrish@gatech.edu.
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“Tech has never turned down a challenge from U(sic)GA,” said Rob Parrish, a student organizer for the event. Last year, Georgia Tech collected one barrel of cans, approximately 300 pounds. The University of Georgia collected more than 20,000 pounds of cans. “We are hoping for ten full barrels of cans,” said Parrish
“I know we are going to win the game on Saturday. It is my sincere hope that we can do almost as well with this challenge,” said Parrish. “Georgia Tech’s motto is Progress and Service, and we must not forget the second part of that.”
Members of the Georgia Tech community may donate canned items through November 25 (by 5:00 p.m.). Blue collection bins are located near the library fountain, next to the Student Government Office in the Student Center, and in the Athletic Association. Large donations or questions about donations should be directed to Parrish at robparrish@gatech.edu.
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Georgia Front Page
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
The Wild Side of Georgia Tech
In a community where greater enrollment is often the goal, several members of the Tech community are concerned with keeping their numbers at a status quo.
Construction project manager Steven Johnson and utilities analyst Susan Wardrope work to keep feral cats on campus at a sustainable level, all while preventing more from moving in. Together with a network of campus participants, the group works on its own time—and in most cases, its own dime—to alter, monitor and feed these felines.
A part of Auxiliary Services during his “day” job, Johnson instills the practice of Trap, Neuter and Release (TNR), which works to equalize rather than eliminate feral cat populations. When animal control officers capture these cats, euthanasia is the typical result, as they are well past the age of human socialization. In doing this, a vacuum is created wherein other feral cats will just move into the area, continuing the cycle.
However, the central TNR theory is that a controlled community of altered cats aids in maintaining area populations and keeping more feral cats from moving in.
“The best advantages to having them altered is that they start to concentrate around the feeding stations, and they don’t have any urge to mate,” Wardrope said. “They have their food, their sleeping place and their area that they’re familiar with.”
“They defend their territory, keeping other cats from moving into the area, which stabilizes the population,” Johnson said. “An unaltered male will travel up to three miles. An altered cat will only travel about 300 meters.”
The program at Tech started in 1996. “We’d get reports of cats in the area,” said Johnson, who added he discovered students and employees were leaving food for the animals.
He said they counted 19 adult and juvenile cats on East Campus in those early days. In the first full feral cat census for the Institute, Johnson said they easily counted 179 cats in late 1998—32 in one colony that lived in the president’s glade. (Today, Johnson says, that colony is down to three occasional visitors.) Now, as far as Johnson and his group can tell, about 34 cats call Tech home, including only two or three unaltered females—which Johnson says he is still trying to trap.
According to the duo, 30 to 35 cats on campus is very sustainable. Each feeding station has enough of a colony for one dominant male and one dominant female that protect the territory. This “territorial management practice” leads to a fairly accurate understanding of where overlap between the colonies exists.
Johnson and Wardrope work to answer the call—literally—if someone reports a cat on campus. “I’ll go out that night, see if it’s a new cat or one of our own,” Johnson said. “If it’s a new cat, I’ll try to stake it out and see where it’s going—to established food stations or somewhere else.” Sometimes, Johnson said, people who don’t know about the campus program put a food dish outside of a building for any “strays” they see.
If it is determined that a sighted cat is a new “resident,” Johnson traps it—an undertaking that may require several hours of waiting. (“I know all the third-shift police officers by name.”) He keeps the caged animal in his garage overnight and then carries it to the vet the next morning. The cats are neutered or spayed, vaccinated—many for the first time—and dosed with flea control medication. Males are released the following day after surgery. Females are released three days later. For captured kittens, Johnson either finds adoptive families or takes them to no-kill shelters after they are socialized.
“Without a feeding program to localize a colony, you’ll continue to have mangy-looking cats that are more susceptible to diseases and other vectors that they can catch.” But, in what could be seen as a disadvantage in the program, unaltered females tend to have larger litters because of the better nutrition. “When we first started, cats were giving birth to four, where only 50 percent survived. Now they can give birth to a litter of nine, and seven will survive,” he said.
One challenge Johnson and Wardrope have noticed is well-wishers often will leave food out, which aids in diluting established feeding stations. “We leave a note and let them know,” he said. “We’re trying to get the word out that there is a good program—just by going from 179 to 34 cats shows it’s working.”
But Johnson and Wardrope are by no means acting alone. Roughly 30 people are on his e-mail list, Johnson said, and about six handle the campus-wide feeding stations. Johnson himself handles the heavy lifting: tracking the cats’ movements and trapping them.
“We just started doing this out-of-pocket,” Johnson said. Through the e-mail network, however, people donated food and money for surgeries beyond spaying and neutering.
The duo’s efforts have led to collaborations outside the Institute. When Fulton County’s Animal Control units respond to an on-campus call, Johnson receives a courtesy call if it’s a cat issue. This in turn has expanded his TNR efforts, establishing partnerships with Fulton, Cobb, Douglas and DeKalb counties.
“It’s a quid pro quo,” he says. “Fulton County has the Fix ‘Em Free program. When they found out we were running this initiative at Tech, they offered us use of this program. In exchange, when they have reports of a feral colony somewhere, I’m available to go out and talk to people [about TNR].”
In assisting with feral cat colonies in off-campus communities, Johnson explains the Trap, Neuter and Return philosophy, letting people know the usual fate of a feral animal taken to a shelter. “Once people learn about the program, and Steve offers to take [the cats] in to have them altered and vaccinated, they usually have no problem throwing food out for them,” Wardrope said.
“I volunteer to support both the Fulton County Animal Services and Catlanta, a local organization that is basically the feral cat coordinator of the Lifeline Animal Project.” Catlanta recently received a grant to aid in the spaying and neutering of feral cats within the area. It’s a supplement to what Fulton County currently provides, and the group is now in negotiations with DeKalb County to create a similar “Fix ‘Em Free” program.
“We’ll help get them spayed or neutered, all of them are vaccinated for rabies [and] they can receive additional vaccinations, if requested,” Johnson said, adding that almost all counties have a low-cost program that supplements the cost of altering a cat or dog. “I mainly concentrate on the feral cats, and I’ll go out and do the assessment—is it just a backyard colony; or an abandoned cat colony that’s gone feral. Then I’ll report to the agency that’s going to sponsor it—Catlanta [or] Southern Hope.”
And evidence points to TNR reducing the load on animal shelters. Excepting a spike due to foreclosure increases, Johnson said, Fulton County has noticed a marked reduction in the amount of feral cats brought to the shelter.
According to Johnson, Atlanta-area programs have attracted the attention of several national organizations, including the Humane Society of the United States and Alley Cat Allies (which fights for TNR protocols nationwide). “We haven’t gotten our city commissions to enact ordinances yet, but we’re working toward that.”
Some organizations, however, oppose the principles of TNR, including People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), The Wildlife Society and the American Bird Conservancy. PETA states on its Web site: “Because of the huge number of feral cats and the severe shortage of good homes, the difficulty of socialization, and the dangers lurking where most feral cats live, it may be necessary—and the most compassionate choice—to euthanize feral cats. ... If you leave them where they are, they will almost certainly die a painful death. A painless injection is far kinder than any fate that feral cats will meet if they are left to survive on their own.”
Johnson doesn’t see it that way.
“In a managed colony, human caretakers have just made portions of [the cats’] lives easier by removing the stress of producing multiple litters,” he said. “By offering a tended food station, caretakers provide a steady supplemental food source, which also permits the cats to be observed for injuries and, when necessary, to be trapped for treatment. A minority of cats specialize in bird hunting as opposed to rodent hunting,” Johnson concedes. “But rodents are still the main natural prey species of outdoor cats. Just because one might kill a chipmunk or Carolina wren does not mean they, as a species living within a habitat, deserve to be exterminated.”
Overall, Johnson and Wardrope are trying to get the feral cat management plan under way in the metro area, and then slowly branch out to the outlying counties. And he’s been reaching out to other University System of Georgia units.
But as for Tech, the next steps for the program include establishing the Library and Information Center’s feeding station and then moving further north on campus to the Howey building and the College of Computing. “We’ve gotten reports from the building manager, as well as from the College of Computing, that they’ve seen cats in the area. We’re trying to identify where would be the best place to establish a feeding station.”
Construction project manager Steven Johnson and utilities analyst Susan Wardrope work to keep feral cats on campus at a sustainable level, all while preventing more from moving in. Together with a network of campus participants, the group works on its own time—and in most cases, its own dime—to alter, monitor and feed these felines.
A part of Auxiliary Services during his “day” job, Johnson instills the practice of Trap, Neuter and Release (TNR), which works to equalize rather than eliminate feral cat populations. When animal control officers capture these cats, euthanasia is the typical result, as they are well past the age of human socialization. In doing this, a vacuum is created wherein other feral cats will just move into the area, continuing the cycle.
However, the central TNR theory is that a controlled community of altered cats aids in maintaining area populations and keeping more feral cats from moving in.
“The best advantages to having them altered is that they start to concentrate around the feeding stations, and they don’t have any urge to mate,” Wardrope said. “They have their food, their sleeping place and their area that they’re familiar with.”
“They defend their territory, keeping other cats from moving into the area, which stabilizes the population,” Johnson said. “An unaltered male will travel up to three miles. An altered cat will only travel about 300 meters.”
The program at Tech started in 1996. “We’d get reports of cats in the area,” said Johnson, who added he discovered students and employees were leaving food for the animals.
He said they counted 19 adult and juvenile cats on East Campus in those early days. In the first full feral cat census for the Institute, Johnson said they easily counted 179 cats in late 1998—32 in one colony that lived in the president’s glade. (Today, Johnson says, that colony is down to three occasional visitors.) Now, as far as Johnson and his group can tell, about 34 cats call Tech home, including only two or three unaltered females—which Johnson says he is still trying to trap.
According to the duo, 30 to 35 cats on campus is very sustainable. Each feeding station has enough of a colony for one dominant male and one dominant female that protect the territory. This “territorial management practice” leads to a fairly accurate understanding of where overlap between the colonies exists.
Johnson and Wardrope work to answer the call—literally—if someone reports a cat on campus. “I’ll go out that night, see if it’s a new cat or one of our own,” Johnson said. “If it’s a new cat, I’ll try to stake it out and see where it’s going—to established food stations or somewhere else.” Sometimes, Johnson said, people who don’t know about the campus program put a food dish outside of a building for any “strays” they see.
If it is determined that a sighted cat is a new “resident,” Johnson traps it—an undertaking that may require several hours of waiting. (“I know all the third-shift police officers by name.”) He keeps the caged animal in his garage overnight and then carries it to the vet the next morning. The cats are neutered or spayed, vaccinated—many for the first time—and dosed with flea control medication. Males are released the following day after surgery. Females are released three days later. For captured kittens, Johnson either finds adoptive families or takes them to no-kill shelters after they are socialized.
“Without a feeding program to localize a colony, you’ll continue to have mangy-looking cats that are more susceptible to diseases and other vectors that they can catch.” But, in what could be seen as a disadvantage in the program, unaltered females tend to have larger litters because of the better nutrition. “When we first started, cats were giving birth to four, where only 50 percent survived. Now they can give birth to a litter of nine, and seven will survive,” he said.
One challenge Johnson and Wardrope have noticed is well-wishers often will leave food out, which aids in diluting established feeding stations. “We leave a note and let them know,” he said. “We’re trying to get the word out that there is a good program—just by going from 179 to 34 cats shows it’s working.”
But Johnson and Wardrope are by no means acting alone. Roughly 30 people are on his e-mail list, Johnson said, and about six handle the campus-wide feeding stations. Johnson himself handles the heavy lifting: tracking the cats’ movements and trapping them.
“We just started doing this out-of-pocket,” Johnson said. Through the e-mail network, however, people donated food and money for surgeries beyond spaying and neutering.
The duo’s efforts have led to collaborations outside the Institute. When Fulton County’s Animal Control units respond to an on-campus call, Johnson receives a courtesy call if it’s a cat issue. This in turn has expanded his TNR efforts, establishing partnerships with Fulton, Cobb, Douglas and DeKalb counties.
“It’s a quid pro quo,” he says. “Fulton County has the Fix ‘Em Free program. When they found out we were running this initiative at Tech, they offered us use of this program. In exchange, when they have reports of a feral colony somewhere, I’m available to go out and talk to people [about TNR].”
In assisting with feral cat colonies in off-campus communities, Johnson explains the Trap, Neuter and Return philosophy, letting people know the usual fate of a feral animal taken to a shelter. “Once people learn about the program, and Steve offers to take [the cats] in to have them altered and vaccinated, they usually have no problem throwing food out for them,” Wardrope said.
“I volunteer to support both the Fulton County Animal Services and Catlanta, a local organization that is basically the feral cat coordinator of the Lifeline Animal Project.” Catlanta recently received a grant to aid in the spaying and neutering of feral cats within the area. It’s a supplement to what Fulton County currently provides, and the group is now in negotiations with DeKalb County to create a similar “Fix ‘Em Free” program.
“We’ll help get them spayed or neutered, all of them are vaccinated for rabies [and] they can receive additional vaccinations, if requested,” Johnson said, adding that almost all counties have a low-cost program that supplements the cost of altering a cat or dog. “I mainly concentrate on the feral cats, and I’ll go out and do the assessment—is it just a backyard colony; or an abandoned cat colony that’s gone feral. Then I’ll report to the agency that’s going to sponsor it—Catlanta [or] Southern Hope.”
And evidence points to TNR reducing the load on animal shelters. Excepting a spike due to foreclosure increases, Johnson said, Fulton County has noticed a marked reduction in the amount of feral cats brought to the shelter.
According to Johnson, Atlanta-area programs have attracted the attention of several national organizations, including the Humane Society of the United States and Alley Cat Allies (which fights for TNR protocols nationwide). “We haven’t gotten our city commissions to enact ordinances yet, but we’re working toward that.”
Some organizations, however, oppose the principles of TNR, including People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), The Wildlife Society and the American Bird Conservancy. PETA states on its Web site: “Because of the huge number of feral cats and the severe shortage of good homes, the difficulty of socialization, and the dangers lurking where most feral cats live, it may be necessary—and the most compassionate choice—to euthanize feral cats. ... If you leave them where they are, they will almost certainly die a painful death. A painless injection is far kinder than any fate that feral cats will meet if they are left to survive on their own.”
Johnson doesn’t see it that way.
“In a managed colony, human caretakers have just made portions of [the cats’] lives easier by removing the stress of producing multiple litters,” he said. “By offering a tended food station, caretakers provide a steady supplemental food source, which also permits the cats to be observed for injuries and, when necessary, to be trapped for treatment. A minority of cats specialize in bird hunting as opposed to rodent hunting,” Johnson concedes. “But rodents are still the main natural prey species of outdoor cats. Just because one might kill a chipmunk or Carolina wren does not mean they, as a species living within a habitat, deserve to be exterminated.”
Overall, Johnson and Wardrope are trying to get the feral cat management plan under way in the metro area, and then slowly branch out to the outlying counties. And he’s been reaching out to other University System of Georgia units.
But as for Tech, the next steps for the program include establishing the Library and Information Center’s feeding station and then moving further north on campus to the Howey building and the College of Computing. “We’ve gotten reports from the building manager, as well as from the College of Computing, that they’ve seen cats in the area. We’re trying to identify where would be the best place to establish a feeding station.”
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