We encourage our businesses to support initiatives in the communities in which they operate. The annual Bakkavör Good Neighbours Award is a way of encouraging our sites to become positively involved in their communities. This has also proved a good way to reward sites for their outstanding effort as they are sometimes too modest to shout about their achievements. The annual prize money is re-invested into local community projects and is shared across those sites judged to have made the greatest positive impact in their local communities and to have integrated solutions to alleviate neighbourhood issues into their business plans. The results of the annual award are announced at our Group Employee Forum.

In 2007 we announced the Group’s commitment to support the UK charity Action Medical Research for three years. As part of this campaign the Group is helping to generate funds by recycling printer cartridges and mobile phones and our first Group event (involving a 100km Ice Cap Trek in Iceland) raised £20,000 for AMR’s Touching Tiny Lives charity.

In Iceland, where our head office is based, we continue to sponsor entrepreneurial studies at the University of Iceland and the University of Reykjavik.  In 2007 we signed a three-year sponsorship contract with Öspin – a sports club for the disabled, - and we support various Icelandic charities, sports clubs and educational projects.