The document proposes a stakeholder dialogue between McCain Foods and stakeholders in Argentina to help shape the company's actions and achieve business objectives. It would involve identifying key stakeholders, understanding their concerns regarding McCain's business operations, and receiving feedback to start a process of dialogue on relevant issues. The dialogue would be facilitated by Forum Empresa and take place in Balcarce, Argentina, McCain's largest Latin American facility. Forum Empresa would deliver a report on the methodology, stakeholders and issues identified, and recommendations for mainstreaming stakeholder engagement. The dialogue aims to help stakeholders understand McCain's strategies and build trust through listening to concerns, with the long term goal of creating a common environmental and social agenda through joint actions

1. A stakeholder dialogue at McCain in Latin-America
Preliminary proposal
Forum Empresa
January 18th 2012
The aim of this proposal is to develop an open dialogue with stakeholders in Argentina as a way to
recognize their insights and views, to help the company shape its actions and to archive its
objectives related to developing the business significantly in the next 5 years.
Specifically:
• To identify the most important stakeholders of the company,
• To raise expectations of the stakeholders and the main concerns regarding McCain
business,
• To receive critical feedback on how Mc Cain is operating its business in Argentina,
• To start a process of dialogue on relevant issues for the company and the stakeholders.
We suggest the manufacture facility located in Balcarce, Argentina to start the dialogues in Latin-
America, the biggest in the region.
Deliverables
Forum Empresa will deliver:
• Facilitation of a 4 hour session with a group of no more than 35 people,
• A full report including the methodology used during the dialogue,
• A list of McCain’s stakeholders in Argentina and their main expectations ,
• A list of critical issues that were mentioned during the dialogue and recommendations on
how to address them,
• The results of the dialogue from the perspective of the participants,
• A summary of conclusions on how the company could further mainstream a stakeholder
engagement program.
Facilitators
IARSE Instituto Argentino de RSE, a partner of Forum Empresa in Argentina
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2. • Alicia Rolando de Serra
She is co-founder, and also Research and Development Director of IARSE (Argentine Institute of
Corporate Social Responsibility). Alicia is in charge of the Academic Coordination of the Annual
Training Courses given by IARSE. These are: CSR Intensive Course for Corporate Executives, and
CSR Actualisation Course for the Upper Management, as well as other training programmes
delivered in Argentina, and in nearby countries.
She is also author and co-author of several publications issued by IARSE and Empresas por la
Infancia (Fundación Arcor; Save the Children; UNICEF).
Alicia leads the team of professionals that generate the management tools (IARSE/ETHOS Self-
Application and Self- Diagnosis Indexes for SMEs and Big Corporations).
This team is also responsible for the formulation and development of specific programmes in
alliance with national and foreign Foundations, Civil Society Organisations and Corporations.
She also does training and consulting in different topics related with the corporate social
responsibility, sustainability reporting, and stakeholder engagement.
• Josefina Shapira
Josefina Schapira is a partner in Perspectivas Sociales from where she conducts research and
performs consulting activities for businesses and social sector organizations.
From 2001 and until 2003 she coordinated a Civic Journalism Initiative funded by the Avina
Foundation which included the participation of mayor local media and more than 500 citizens.
From 2006 until 2009 she was responsible for AVINA’s "Learning Cycle", a quantitative research
performed annualy to meet the expectations and satisfaction of their leaders and partners in Latin
America and since 2005 collaborates in qualitative research conducted in different AVINA offices
in Latin America.
She participated in the systematization of different perspectives on CSR in two meetings of the
Network of Latin America and the Caribbean promoters of CSR organized by IARSE / Kellogg
Foundation.
In the past seven years she has been working with the NGO Inclusion Social in developing
strategies for positioning "work culture" and for bridging the gap between young people and their
potential employers through dialogue.
In 2011 she signed a biannual advisory and research agreement with Junior Achievement
Foundation's office in Cordoba to measure the impact of the programs that they teach and to
identify and then speed up communication processes with stakeholders.
She is also responsible for measuring the impact of the project "Women Entrepreneurs"
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3. coordinated by the Junior Achievement Foundation for the Americas and Citi in Argentina,
Paraguay, Peru and Dominican Republic.
She is a member of the Advisory Council on Inclusion Social Foudation since 2004 and member of
the Board of Directors of the Argentine Institute of Corporate Social Responsibility since 2009.
Methodology
Step 1: Planning the dialogue
We suggest starting conversations with McCain UK, Argentina, Forum and IARSE in order to agree
on the following issues:
1.1. Jointly defining the focus and purpose of the dialogue.
1.2. Clarifying if this action is connected to others including stakeholders.
1.3. Securing the involvement of senior executives.
1.4. Guarantying commitments.
Step 2: Setting rules and conditions
2.1. To list stakeholders to be invited.
The definition will consider these criteria:
o Responsibility
o Influence
o Interests
o Tensions
o Expectations
o Dependency
o Representation
A map including the ability and impact of each stakeholder will be validated with the company.
A preliminary list of invited Stakeholders to be checked with Mc Cain is included below:
• Senior executives of the company
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4. • Employees (trade union representatives)
• Customers (selection of main clients in Argentina)
• Consumers (associations of consumers)
• Suppliers (representatives of associations of farmers and other types of suppliers)
• Government (local and national authorities on health, agriculture, environment and
energy)
• Interest groups (environmentalist, national and local journalists, other nonprofit groups
related to agriculture)
Approximately thirty senior representatives are expected. Representatives will be able to reflect
the concerns of major stakeholder groups, and will secure expertise, reputation, time and goodwill
towards the dialogue.
2.2. To design rules for participation: confidentiality, public communication of the dialogue.
2.3. To define the topics to be addressed and debated and to review emerging topics that could
unexpectedly arise.
The dialogue will focus on two main issues:
• Food and agriculture
• Environment and water usage
A preliminary list of issues is included below:
• Information regarding seeds and its effect on health
• Contractual relations with farmers. Selection of suppliers
• Sustainable farming
• Working methods
• Labor conditions
• Balanced diet in the community.
• Information on potato processing
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5. • Waste disposal and treatment
• Use of energy and water
• Information on environmental impact report
• Distribution process: truck traffic
The selection of issues will be made together with the company throwing an activity aiming to
map stakeholders´ expectations and its impact on the business. Please consider the following as an
example of this tool.
Stakeholder Expectation Effect
Consumers Quality products Sales
Investors Low risk and high profitability Capital
Employees Good working conditions Productivity
Governments and authorities That are responsible Legislations and regulations
‘accountable’
Local community Socioeconomic development Legitimacy / license to operate
NGOs Transparency and equity Reputation
Industry Minimum standard Best practice
However, the selection of topics should be careful about raising issues the company is not
prepared or does not deserve to address. For this purpose each of the topics will be analyzed
considering relevance and the ability to respond during the dialogue.
Step 3: Delivering the workshop dialogue
3.1. To help stakeholders to gain a better understanding of corporate strategies and operations.
3.2. To build trust through listening to the real expectations of the stakeholders and to start a
dialogue on their main areas of concern.
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6. 3.3. To respond or commit to responding and informing stakeholders of future plans.
Step 4: Measuring results
A full report will measure the results including the methodology used during the dialogue; a list of
McCain´s stakeholders in Argentina and their main expectations; a list of critical issues that were
mentioned during the dialogue and recommendations on how to address them; the dialogue
participants evaluation results; and a summary of conclusions on how the company could further
mainstream a stakeholder engagement program.
In the short term future: To elaborate plans and programs taking into account the expectations of
the stakeholders and informing them of advances.
In the long term future: The vision is to create a common environmental and social agenda. This
agenda of common interests could lead to the process of creating joint actions in order to archive
new management standards (together with workers), common goals regarding local living
conditions (together with neighbors and local authorities) and actions to improve the green
environment shared by the company and the community (together with environmentalists).
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7. About Forum Empresa
FORUM EMPRESA is an alliance of CSR-based business organizations that promotes corporate
social responsibility (CSR) throughout the Americas. Its mission is to articulate and reinforce the
Forum Empresa Network’s member organizations in their objective of fomenting Corporate Social
Responsibility in their respective countries, favoring interaction and exchange between them. It
also works on common projects with international organizations with the purpose of promoting
CSR in a specific country or region.
About IARSE
The Argentine Institute of Corporate Social Responsibility (IARSE) was founded in 2002. It is a
private, nonprofit organization created with the initial support of the Foundations W. K. Kellogg
from United States, and AVINA from Switzerland.
Now it has a strong and growing group of member companies that support it in fulfilling its
mission. It focuses on making available information and management tools to incorporate the
practice of CSR in business organizations. It also produces spaces that allow the exchange of
experiences between stakeholders from business, social and academic fields, and promotes
mutual cooperation between the companies that have decided to make responsible behavior a
value to build a more just and sustainable economy.
A committed team of specialists from the world of business and the social sector has succeeded in
making the institution become one of the main national and regional references on CSR.
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