The evaluation of our activity helps us to improve and strengthens us in the context of a pandemic

Transparency characterizes us. Sostre Cívic, as a cooperative member of the Social and Solidarity Economy (ESS) every year we do the Social Balance that promotes the Solidarity Economy Network (XES). You may wonder what this Social Balance is -worth the redundancy-, so it is an accountability tool that measures the social, environmental and good governance impact of SSE entities, as are we. To be more specific, it evaluates systematically, objectively and periodically six major features, such as economic operation and profit policy; the gender perspective; equity and internal democracy; environmental sustainability; social commitment and cooperation and the quality of work. This year, as it could not be otherwise, Sostre Cívic has self-assessed all these aspects and the result indicates that we continue to improve.

The Social Balance is useful to us every year, but in times of pandemic even more so because it helps us know what we need to improve, and this strengthens us. Looking first at where we have improved, we see that in economic terms we have allocated our positive result to both mandatory and voluntary reserves - in fact, as we always do, since we are a non-profit cooperative -. In 2020, we have increased our activity considerably from €497.348 to €616.095. In addition, 31% of the loans we obtain are from ethical and cooperative finance, and the other large part are from public banking through the Institut Català de Finances (ICF), while 95% of our financial resources also are deposited in this type of entity. 

From a gender perspective, it remains pretty much the same as other years, as you can see in the infographics, though this 2020 has increased the presence of women in the general composition of the cooperative: 63% of members are women. In addition, both at the level of housing projects and within the coaching staff, we care about the care of groups, since we want to prevent and reduce potential conflicts and address those that arise with more awareness and resources. When we talk about care, however, we also include the care of the elderly and the feminist perspective. A Sostre Cívic we look after the fairness and internal democracy of our cooperative.

In the field of environmental sustainability, we remain the same as in 2019 with a percentage of 78%. A Sostre Cívic we have an environmental management action plan, with which we carry out internal control of the buildings' CO2 emissions; we provide assistance in relation to transport; we carry out practices for saving and energy efficiency; we have the electricity service with 100% renewable companies; we incorporate responsible consumption criteria when purchasing products and organize events with environmental criteria. In the cooperative housing projects that we develop, therefore, we incorporate a sustainable aspect in the energy systems of the building. For example, the projects we are building in Barcelona com La Balma, in Poblenou and Cirerers, in Roquetes, have a wooden structure. 

In addition, the work office is located in one of the shared premises of the Ecos Group in which several sustainable actions with the environment are carried out: the shared purchase of recycled paper; the use of energy from renewable sources; the implementation of a water filtration system and the use of ecological cleaning products, among others. With this, our goal is to keep looking after the environment with everything we have at our disposal and keep improving day after day.

Since Sostre Cívic we are very committed to mutual cooperation, starting with sharing space in the Ecos cooperative group, made up of companies from the social and solidarity economy. As far as possible, we share knowledge, management and different projects. Besides, we allocate 62% of our purchases to social market suppliers, a complicated task to carry out depending on the sector in which each ESS company is located. In our case, we can work with social market companies, but there are others that have it more difficult and that is why the average is 17%. 

Regarding the quality of work of Sostre Cívic, we comply with preventive and/or health promotion measures at the workplace; with the improvements to the permits established by law in reconciling family and work life and with spaces for emotional attention and care for female workers in the work environment. Also, the resolution of this aspect is achieved with a high percentage, although we still have a way to go in terms of the regulation or internal protocol that improves the working conditions established by the agreement. 

The Social Balance is a very effective tool to help us improve all the companies that are part of the ESS. At the end of the year it shows us whether or not we have progressed in financial or economic terms, the percentage of purchases we allocate to social market suppliers and how we have improved in terms of parity. These data encourage us to keep progressing and see the impact of our work: we have seen how women make up more than half of the social base, that we have increased our activity and that we do what we can to provide ourselves with companies in the social economy. Even so, we bear in mind that this 2020 in particular has been a complicated year and the Social Balance has helped us see the lights and shadows of our activity and come out stronger from the context of the Covid-19 pandemic than unfortunately we have to live. As always, then, we will continue to advance and improve in all aspects that concern us.

The 2020 Social Balance of the Solidarity Economy Network is aboutimpact that the crisis triggered by Covid-19 is having on ESS entities, in order to be able to design plans and proposals in the medium and long term. The final objective, according to those responsible for the Social Balance at the XES, is that this tool also serves to provide a joint response to the context of uncertainty and social crisis that we are experiencing as a result of the pandemic. You can find it atpublications section of the XES website, as well as the executive summary, and retrieve the presentation that was made on November 16 at FESC repository, if you were unable to attend.