Chunghwa Telecom

Chunghwa Telecom has preferential broadband plans for low-income households. With regard to accessibility, the company offers a special app for the visually impaired, and it reports the number of its employees with disabilities. The company also reports how the economic value it generates is distributed among its stakeholders.

The company provides smartphone training courses for visually impaired users, demonstrating its support for people with disabilities. It also donates technology to various primary and secondary schools to promote school connectivity.

Chunghwa Telecom demonstrates its best practices in this area, with dedicated executive-level positions and committees taking up high-level responsibility for cybersecurity. Additionally, the company has a group privacy policy and international certifications regarding information security. It also demonstrates best practice by reporting the number of data breaches and law enforcement requests for personal information.

Chunghwa Telecom collaborates with universities to promote open source projects. It also shows commitment to innovation by providing venture capital investment. Furthermore, the company shows dedication to sustainability by developing energy efficient products and services. It also states a commitment towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and discloses the number of its women employees working in research and development (R&D).

Chunghwa Telecom has an opportunity to reduce the gender digital divide by supporting digital inclusivity for women and girls. It can also make a high-level commitment towards advancing accessible design.

The company has opportunities to support programmes for intermediate and technical skills development. It can also consider conducting an impact assessment for its existing programmes.

The company can expand on its cybersecurity practices by making a copy of its information security management certifications publicly available. It can also make a high-level commitment towards child online safety and disclose the measures it takes to protect children online.

Chunghwa Telecom can make a public commitment to support open source standards. It can also demonstrate how it supports the tech start-up ecosystem and ethical R&D.

Chunghwa Telecom has a process to identify and assess salient human rights issues associated with its own operations and with its business relationships. It also provides examples of how it addresses its salient human rights risks. The company has a grievance mechanism that is accessible to workers to raise human rights concerns and complaints, but this mechanism is not accessible to external stakeholders. Additionally, the company has an opportunity to firmly commit to respecting human rights and the ILO core labour rights.

Chunghwa Telecom publicly commits to respecting worker health and safety and places health and safety expectations on its business relationships. Furthermore, the company discloses information on the collective bargaining agreements covering its workforce. However, it does not explicitly state that it does not require workers to work more than regular and overtime hours, nor does it provide evidence in relation to paying its workers a living wage. The company provides a breakdown of employees in different employee categories by age, gender and at least another diversity metric. It also reports basic salary and remuneration of women compared to men across employee categories along with providing time-bound targets to achieve gender equality. However, the company does not have a public commitment to promote gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Chunghwa Telecom discloses a global tax strategy but not its income tax payments in individual tax jurisdictions. The company has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption. However, it does not include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its business relationship contracts, and it does not have a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints on the topic. Furthermore, the company does not disclose its approach to lobbying and political engagement. Specifically, the company has no public statement that indicates it does not make political contributions. It does, however, provide information on its lobbying expenditures.