Social Responsibility and Interaction with Stakeholders

As part of the implementation of these programmes, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC works closely with regional authorities and local governments. The Group pays special attention to agreements on social and economic cooperation with the regional governments and district administrations of Irkutsk Region, the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), and Krasnoyarsk Region. 

Charity and Sponsor Support

Partnership and joining forces are the key to success in achieving sustainable development goals, which is why the INK Group is actively involved in cultural, environmental and charitable projects.

Collaboration with the Russian Children’s Foundation

The INK Group pays special attention to charitable assistance to children and children’s institutions. In accordance with the agreement concluded in 2011 between Irkutsk Oil Company LLC and the Irkutsk Region Branch of the Russian Children’s Fund, support is provided to orphans and children with disabilities living in the north of the Angara region. The company regularly sponsors educational, health, and sports events for schoolchildren and construction of playgrounds and supports programmes for the treatment of childhood diabetes and other diseases.

Sports Associations Support

Irkutsk Oil Company LLC is a regular sponsor of basketball, boxing, hockey, track and field, and chess children’s and youth sports federations. On an annual basis, the company supports youth ball hockey tournaments on the territory of Ust-Kut District. In addition, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC entered into a sponsorship agreement with the Irkutsk Region Basketball Federation, which aims to popularise this sport among children and adults in the region.

Environmental Initiatives

The group regularly conducts environmental actions in the areas where it operates, supports “green” movements, and interacts with stakeholders on its environmental policy and the greening of production processes. Irkutsk Oil Company LLC provides support to environmental non-profit organizations that implement relevant conservation projects in their areas of operation. Marina Sedykh, General Director of JSC INK-Capital, is a member of the Board of Trustees of the environmental foundation "Save Baikal!", which supports enlightenment, educational and upbringing projects and programmes in the field of ecology. Together with the Irkutsk branch of the All-Russian Society of Nature Conservation, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC has been organizing the Clean Waters of the Baikal Region initiative to clean the banks of rivers and lakes for many years. Among the schools of Ust-Kut Irkutsk Oil Company LLC holds the contest Whose Tail is Longer, which creatively motivates children to collect plastic bottles and create interesting art objects from recyclable materials. In order to educate the residents of Ust-Kut about the environment, together with entrepreneurs and eco-activists the company organized a long-term project Plastic in Action for the collection and recycling of plastic packaging. Irkutsk Oil Company LLC was awarded a Certificate of Merit from the V. I. Vernadsky Non-Governmental Ecological Foundation for its long-term support of public environmental projects.

Employees of the group do not remain aloof from environmental issues and take an active part in environmental events: they hold voluntary clean-ups, do environmental education in schools, and organise events for collecting and sorting waste.

Support of culture projects

From one year to another, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC financially supports significant cultural and social events in the region: the Stars on Baikal international academic music festival, the Baikal Poetry Festival, the Northern Descent cultural event, the Ch Day reading festival and many other events.

An integral part of the company’s charitable activity is the support of organizations engaged in the restoration of spiritual culture in the Irkutsk Region. With the help of the INK Group Orthodox churches and chapels were built in the town of Ust-Kut, in the village of Anga in the Kachug District, in the shift camp at the Yaraktinskoye field, and in the Verkhnemarkovo settlement. Among the religious organizations assisted by Irkutsk Oil Company LLC in different years were the Manla Buddhist Community and the Jewish Community of the Irkutsk Region.

Youth Council

In addition to participating in external charity events, managers and employees have always been eager to initiate their own projects: Christmas gifts for children from orphanages, collecting funds for seriously ill children, and congratulating veterans.

Charity, kindness, and compassion have always been at the core of the Irkutsk Oil Company LLC corporate culture. The creation of the volunteer movement was a logical continuation of the charitable initiatives of the company and its employees.

Since 2018, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC has had a Volunteer Council, which has brought together groups of volunteers in the following areas:

• Charity — support for socially vulnerable groups.
• Healthy lifestyle — promotion of a healthy lifestyle.
• Eco-Team — environmental projects.
• Zoopatrol — help for animals.
• Share kindness — covers all volunteer activities in Ust-Kut.

Over 10 % of the Group’s employees living in Irkutsk and Ust-Kut participate in volunteer activities on a permanent basis.

Irkutsk Oil Company LLC volunteers already have dozens of successful projects under their belt. In 2020, despite the epidemic restrictions, volunteers continued their work: an action on sewing orthopaedic pillows for palliative children was held, the Book Boomerang project was launched (collecting books for shift camps), assistance was provided to Irkutsk City Hospital No. 7 (hospice) in purchasing hygiene products and spring landscaping (buying and planting flowers) and to animal kennels Noy-Podovog, Tomasina, K-9, Kotokafe, Zhil-Byl-Pyos. Volunteers made cosmetic repairs in the apartments of World War II veteran

On a regular basis there are events to collect batteries, recyclable materials, voluntary clean-ups of the shores of Lake Baikal and the rivers Ushakovka and Angara. At the end of the year, eco-volunteers held a contest to make Christmas decorations from recycled materials, which were used to decorate the trees in the head office. The volunteer movement regularly cooperates with the charitable foundations Children of Baikal Region, Baikal Children, the crisis centres Obereg and Maria, the Cheremkhovsky Children’s Home No. 1, the Sverdlovsky Children’s Home of Irkutsk, the Markovsky Gerontology Centre and other institutions.

Interaction with Indigenous Minorities of the North

In order to minimize the negative impact on the way of life of indigenous minorities of the North and ethnic groups equated to them, Irkutsk Oil Company LLC necessarily takes into account the opinion of the local population on the location of future production facilities, rotational camps, and transport communications. Over the years of cooperation, partnerships have been established with 18 clan communities of indigenous minorities, the Evenki Cultural Centre, four regional associations, and the Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North (RAIPON).

Irkutsk Oil Company LLC sponsored the publication of a collection of literary works by indigenous authors in three languages — native indigenous, Russian, and English. The Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North has selected the best works of the authors writing about the life, everyday life, traditions and customs of indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East of the Russian Federation for the collection.

Irkutsk Oil Company LLC annually donates about 250,000 litres of motor fuel for boats, snowmobiles and diesel-electric generating stations to hunters and residents of national settlements in the Irkutsk region on a gratuitous basis. The company also provides ongoing financial support to clan communities for the implementation of measures to preserve the traditional way of life.

Grant Competitions

Since 2019, the group has been implementing a programme of grant support for socially significant initiatives in the Irkutsk Region. Energy of Native Land contest is held for non-profit partnerships and budgetary institutions of Ust-Kutsky, Nizhneilimsky, Kirensky, and Katangsky Districts. Grants are aimed at human development, promotion of healthy lifestyle, and preservation of historical and cultural heritage.

Seven socially significant projects are implemented in 2021 on the territory of Ust-Kutsky, Kirensky, Nizhneilimsky and Katangsky Districts of the Irkutsk Region. The projects were selected from 59 applications from public organizations and cultural, sport, and educational institutions.

Another grant competition held by Irkutsk Oil Company LLC  is called My Dream District and is held in Ust-Kutsky District for the representatives of territorial public self-governments, home unit companies, non-profit and state-funded organisations. The competition aims to support the improvement of residential and public areas in Ust-Kut and Ust-Kutsky District and to motivate especially zealous homeowners to form new territorial public self-governments.

Interaction with stakeholders

Irkutsk Oil Company Group is actively cooperating with stakeholders in environmental protection activities. The scheduled projects are subject to public discussions even if it is not required by the legislation of the Russian Federation. The information on the Group’s environmental activities is available to public and is discussed with the representatives of the community.

To facilitate this, in 2020 the Group opened the Information Centre of OOO Irkutsk Oil Company called "Ust-Kut. Territory of the Future" where anyone who has questions as to the Group’s activities can find necessary information. The address of the Centre is 41 Kirova, room 23, Ust-Kut, Irkutsk Oblast. The Information Centre regularly hosts meetings, press-conferences, call-in shows, roundtable discussions with stakeholders, including public consulting meetings on the Irkutsk Polymer Plant building project and other projects under the interaction with stakeholders plan which is an integral part of the sustainable development of OOO Irkutsk Oil Company Group.

Collaboration with scientific and educational facilities

OOO Irkutsk Oil Company Group cooperates with different educational institutions.

Working with youth is based on a practical approach that includes hosting internships, presenting cases and introducing the concept of sustainable development to school and university students. In 2021 OOO Irkutsk Oil Company hosted a competition called A Look at Sustainable Business at the V Baikal Risk-Forum. The participants of the competition went over the strategies of sustainable development of the company taking into consideration the available experience and projects as well as current global agenda.

The research activities of the company in environmental protection are facilitated by a number of scientific institutions. OOO Irkutsk Oil Company is a member of the world-class Baikal Interregional Research and Educational Centre focused on the use of green technologies and compliance with the environmental safety requirements on the regional level. The work of the Centre is supervised by the heads of Irkutsk Oblast and the Republic of Buryatia.

Marina Sedykh Charity Fund

The Marina Sedykh Charity Fund provides targeted assistance to children with disabilities, socially disadvantaged people, seriously ill or in a difficult life situation in the Irkutsk Region. The Fund also implements its own social projects to support disadvantaged groups and holds regular charity events. By 9 May, veterans of the Great Patriotic War, home front workers, and children of war receive food packages. On the eve of September 1, children from low-income families with many children in Ust-Kutsky and Nizhneilimsky districts are given school bags with school supplies as part of the School Bag programme.

The Marina Sedykh Charity Fund Projects:

• Health to Children — organising regular visits of a team of doctors from Irkutsk to receive children in the Ust-Kutsky District
• Give the Gift of Joy to Children; Happy Holidays, Friends! — Purchasing gifts for children’s and other organizations for anniversary events
• Got an Idea! — support for start-ups of small and medium-sized businesses
• New Year's Miracle — buying New Year’s gifts for children from low-income families
• Family Homestead — support for people with mental disabilities
• Plastic in Action — collecting plastic bottles for their recycling in Ust-Kut
• Whose Tail is Longer? — competition among schoolchildren of the Ust-Kutsky district to create art objects from recycled materials.

The Marina Sedykh Charity Fund launched the Stop Covid rehabilitation plan for residents of Ust-Kut District who suffered moderate to severe COVID-19 under a specially developed and approved rehabilitation program by the Russian Ministry of Health. The rehabilitation of the Ust-Kut District Hospital healthcare workers is also covered by the Fund.