Officeworks is Australia’s leading retailer and supplier of office products and solutions for home, business and education.

With more than 6,000 team members, we cater for a broad range of customers that include small-to-large size businesses, students and teachers, health care services, private, public and government organisations, as well as personal shoppers.

We provide our customers with three convenient ways to shop: a national network of retail stores; online at www.officeworks.com.au, via the Officeworks smartphone and tablet applications and Facebook’s Shop & Share application; or by telephone/fax at our customer service centres in Melbourne and Sydney.

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During the year we opened six new Officeworks stores. At 30 June 2012, there were 139 Officeworks stores and two Harris Technology business centres operating across Australia.

We remain committed to providing a safe place to work, with a focus this year on taking personal responsibility for safety and wellbeing. There has been an 11.2 per cent decrease in LTIFR at 30 June 2012.

The decrease in LTIFR can be attributed to the cultural change in team members’ behaviour in safety as a consequence of the launch of the Stay Safe System. There was also a favourable decrease in the total recordable injury frequency rate (TRIFR) over the reporting period from 36.2 to 35.9 or by 1.0 per cent.

We continued to support MobileMuster, the Australian mobile phone industry’s product stewardship program, with our stores providing a point of collection for our customers to responsibly dispose and recycle their unwanted mobile phones, batteries and accessories. Our collection of over 2,900 kilograms of mobile phones and accessories has more than doubled our previous year’s collection. We developed our first EcoOK business supplies catalogue with the aim of simplifying the decision-making process for our customers where they seek to buy environmentally preferred products.

We are committed to supporting charitable organisations and community activities and during the year we contributed to a variety of local and national programs.

All of our stores supported Blue September to raise funds for the Australian Cancer Research Foundation and Bowel Cancer Australia and Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea to raise funds for The Cancer Council. Our Officeworks stores also supported appeals for ANZAC Day and Remembrance Day, where fundraising merchandise was sold to support the Returned and Services League of Australia, the United Returned Soldiers Fund New South Wales and the ANZAC Day Commemoration Committee Queensland.

We also supported a variety of projects and organisations such as education facilities, sporting bodies, Scouts Australia, Girl Guides Australia, aged-care centres, healthcare facilities, Rotary Clubs and Lions Clubs through activities such as community barbeques, gift cards and team member volunteering, as well as facilitating customer donations.

Our total contribution to local communities during 2011/12 was $1.06 million.

During the year, we launched the Stay Safe Program to help simplify and align the injury management procedures, forms and tools. The program was developed to help leaders understand the injury management process in order to help facilitate early return to work strategies. Various other initiatives were also launched during the year, including a Stay Safe postcard which was sent to all team members’ home addresses reminding them to focus on safe behaviours while at work. A poster was also developed for display at stores to act as a reminder of safety choices, and team members facilitated discussion around key risk areas through cluster communication meetings.

As at 30 June 2012, our workforce was equally represented by males and females. There were 601 management positions, and of these positions 36 per cent were held by females. Through our Climate Survey, 53 team members identified themselves as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander, up from 36 in the previous reporting period.

We continued our focus on product stewardship initiatives in partnership with MobileMuster and Cartridges 4 Planet Ark. Recycling stations are provided for customers at the front of all our stores, with collections of mobile phones and accessories increasing by 102 per cent to 2,914 kilograms from the previous period. Ink and toner cartridge recycling increased by 17 per cent with a total of 698,451 units diverted from landfill.

Three Officeworks stores continued a recycling trial for batteries, and two Officeworks stores are currently taking part in Byteback for the collection and recycling of computers. The learnings from the Byteback scheme have contributed to the implementation of the National Television and Computer Recycling Scheme. Officeworks is a liable party under the Product Stewardship (Televisions and Computers) Regulations 2011 and has signed up to a co-regulatory arrangement.

Our total water usage during the year was 52 megalitres. This was extrapolated from more than 5,000 days of billing from 29 free‑standing stores.

Our total recycling increased to 2,939 tonnes and waste to landfill also increased to 2,314 tonnes. Our greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 1.5 per cent to 65,975 tonnes CO² equivalent (excluding air travel).

In May this year, we joined Sedex, a not-for-profit organisation responsible for driving supply chain improvements in responsible and ethical business practices. Sedex will further enhance our understanding of suppliers’ performance in labour standards, health and safety, the environment and business ethics.

During the year, we implemented our Supplier Code of Conduct and Responsible Forest Products Procurement Policy. We also sent our first forestry survey to our local and international suppliers of forest-based products. We are currently reviewing the results of the survey to ensure that our suppliers conform to our policy.

• Continue contributing to the health and wellbeing of the communities in which we operate
• Looking after our team members and making Officeworks a great place to work
• Improving our environmental reporting and reducing our stores’ environmental footprint
• Continue focus on our ethical sourcing program, in particular the transparency of our forest products supply chain and ethical business practices
• Providing our customers with information about products and services which lower their environmental impact and help them to make environmentally sensitive purchasing decisions