Purpose

The purpose of this environmental policy is to indicate our organisational commitment to addressing environmental issues within The Black Arts Co and through the services we deliver. This document outlines what The Black Arts Co will do to identify our environmental impact, how we will adapt to reduce our impact, and the responsibilities of team members in this space.

Scope

This policy applies to employees and contractors, both full time and part time. The policy will be shared with suppliers, potential partners and consultants wherever appropriate to indicate our commitment to environmental action.

Action

The Black Arts Co is committed to accelerating a just transition to net zero and reducing the impact on the environment from our operations and service delivery. We will address this through the following areas of work:

Staff engagement

We will promote responsibility for the environment within the organisation and communicate and implement this policy at all levels of our team. We commit to ensuring key members of staff have the time necessary to embed this work into our operations and providing further resource where possible and necessary. 

We will encourage and support staff to set up a staff climate working group for those with a personal or professional interest in the area, making sure that this group is representative of all levels of the organisation.

We will support staff wellbeing by considering how we promote positive, action-led messaging about climate breakdown and provide opportunities for them to change the ways they work for The Black Arts Co in line with positive climate behaviours. We will provide space for staff to discuss this issue, including their own concerns and worries about environmental breakdown, through any wider wellbeing programmes in place.

The senior management team of The Black Arts Co will:

• Share its expectation of responsibility for the environment to employees, board members and secretariat service providers.

• Demonstrate clear commitment to the environment and lead by example, to ensure that the protection of the environment is promoted to all employees.

• Support team wellbeing and work to combat hopelessness by committing to driving action in the organisation and setting a positive example.

• The employees of The Black Arts Co will:

• Be familiar with all the environmental requirements relevant to their role and responsibilities, including exploring the carbon footprint/environmental impact of specific areas of work;- take responsibility for their own impact on the environment while in the workplace and working from home, sharing ideas with other staff members on how to reduce personal impact.

Operations

The sustainability of our services is important for the people and organisations we work with. 

As part of delivering our mission in line with our values and charitable objectives, we will assess the environmental impacts of our operations and set objectives and targets annually in order to improve our internal carbon emissions. We will review these targets annually. This work will include:

• Monitoring utilities consumption in office buildings and home working

• Promoting, encouraging and rewarding green travel choices from employees

• Conscious consideration of the amount of travel necessary for our services to go ahead, encouraging green transportation modes and/or providing remote access to events

• Review our waste and educate employees about effective recycling and reducing use of single use plastic where possible

• Communicate with the communities we work with about climate breakdown and how it is relevant to our mission, vision and values

• Generally increase communications about the climate crisis, to encourage awareness within our networks and the communities we work with

• Comply with all relevant environmental legislation and regulations

Governance

Our trustees have overall responsibility for The Black Arts Co and its strategy. We commit to exploring on an annual basis the impact climate breakdown will have or is having on the people and organisations we work with. This work should include, but is not limited to: 

• Discussing at board meetings how our mission, vision and values intersect with climate breakdown and how to embed climate actions in our strategy, business planning and organisational goals.

• Providing a short statement each year outlining the discussions we have had around climate breakdown and any action we have taken, alongside our aims for the following business year.

• Making time to discuss practical strategic actions at the annual board meetings. 

Suppliers and procurement

The suppliers of The Black Arts Co. will:

• Share environmental policies or describe planned actions if a formal policy is not in place when entering into any contract or agreement. 

• Work with us to reduce the impacts of the goods and services purchased from them wherever possible.

• We recognise that although we may not be able to reject suppliers based solely on their sustainability credentials that asking questions raises the profile of this issue, and that we may partly influence behaviours through this action alone. Our engagement with suppliers is designed to identify suppliers with values which align with our own, and we will make public our preference to work with organisations who minimise their environmental impact wherever possible.