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Sustainability
Social investment
Our goal and strategy
Our goal is to create positive, long-term economic and social impact for communities where we live, work and play. For over 140 years, Imperial has contributed by providing well-paying jobs to Canadians, developing and sourcing from local suppliers, paying taxes and royalties to governments and investing in social programs and partnerships across the country.
Our social investment strategy and activities are aligned with our sustainability focus areas, and are designed to influence meaningful change. Through ongoing engagement, feedback and collaboration with our partners, we are investing in shared solutions to build resiliency within our local communities. We measure impact using data-driven tools and criteria, developed in collaboration with London Benchmarking Group Canada and our community partners.
2021 notable metrics
> $17 M
invested in Canadian communities1
170
organizations supported Imperial and through generosity of our employees to > 1,000 non-profits/charities*
$3 M
raised for United Way organizations across Canada
> 6,200
hours of employee volunteer time in Canadian communities
Our focus areas
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Climate
Collaborating with our community partners to develop energy solutions in support of Canada’s net zero goal.
• Forests Ontario: Supporting forest restoration in Southern Ontario
• Quest Canada: Assessing energy needs and advancing solutions in our neighbouring Indigenous communities.
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Indigenous relations
Establishing and maintaining respectful relationships to support strong Indigenous communities.
• ACTUA: Unlocking the potential of Indigenous youth through STEM land-based summer camps
• Indspire: Continuing over 20 years of bursary and scholarship support. Sponsors of the awards celebrating the best in Indigenous culture
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People
Investing in equality for people in Canada and championing mental health initiatives to support our workforce and our communities.
• 2021 Fueling what Matters campaign: raised awareness and $200K for Canadian Mental Health Association
• 2021 Healthcare Heroes campaign: donated $2.5M in free fuel to front-line healthcare workers.
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Land and water
Supporting innovation and collaboration to reduce environmental impacts to air, land and water.
• Circular Great Lakes partnership sponsoring circular economy research and strategy for plastics resource recovery
• Keyano College’s Indigenous environmental monitoring program, incorporating Indigenous ways of knowing.
Economic development
Imperial is working to integrate our sustainability focus areas within our supply chain management approach, seeking opportunities to diversify our supplier network, minimize environmental impacts and collectively contribute to our communities’ resilience and quality of life.
Why we invest
Shared value is the foundation of our partnerships. While meeting community needs, we also use the following criteria to guide our investment decisions:
- Strengthens relationships with our community members and other external audiences
- Results in positive outcomes in our areas of operation
- ON (GTA, Southern Ontario, Sarnia, Nanticoke, Ottawa)
- AB (Edmonton, Athabasca/Fort McMurray, Cold Lake,
Strathcona County, Calgary)
- Norman Wells, NWT
- NL and Labrador - Offers employee engagement and/or volunteering opportunities
- Supports workforce skill development and inclusion and diversity
- Aligns with community investment focus area(s)
Meet our requirements?
We give to hundreds of organizations across Canada every year who meet our eligibility requirements. If you would like to apply for funding, please make sure you are eligible to apply.
We will review your application to ensure eligibility criteria are met. You’ll hear back from us within a minimum of four to six weeks of your application submission.
All applications and proposals must be submitted online.
Investments in action
Related content
Sustainability report
Our Sustainability Report describes our environmental, social and governance performance.
Learn more footnotes
1Every year London Benchmarking Group Canada audits our community investment portfolio and program to help us understand the total value to community of our cash and in-kind donations, our employee volunteer hours as well as our program management costs. Evaluation of our cash donations also reflects a portion of our community benefits agreements with Indigenous communities allocated to support community project funding including Indigenous leadership and capacity building.
2Amplification rate of 34 per cent – LBG Canada states that for every dollar invested by Imperial, stakeholders like other companies or governments, invested an additional $0.34 towards priority projects.