Skip to main content

Kofi Annan helps formwork specialist Pilosio take CSR to the next level

Italian formwork specialist Pilosio held its fourth annual Building Peace Award in the historic setting of Venice’s Scuola Grande on Friday 12 September. This year’s winner was politician Samia Yaba Nkrumah, the daughter of Ghana’s first democratically elected president, highlighting her planned project to build a new library and learning space in Akosombo, near Lake Volta, dedicated to her father. Over 300 guests from around the world, including 150 Pilosio clients, attended the event and heard keynote sp
September 16, 2014 Read time: 3 mins
Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the United Nations
Italian formwork specialist Pilosio held its fourth annual Building Peace Award in the historic setting of Venice’s Scuola Grande on Friday 12 September. This year’s winner was politician Samia Yaba Nkrumah, the daughter of Ghana’s first democratically elected president, highlighting her planned project to build a new library and learning space in Akosombo, near Lake Volta, dedicated to her father.

Over 300 guests from around the world, including 150 7163 Pilosio clients, attended the event and heard keynote speaker Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the 3262 United Nations, speak about the event’s theme: ‘Women as builders of Peace”. Annan also outlined the importance of corporate social responsibility and the need for the public and private sectors to work together:

“Given the problems we face, we cannot rely on governments to deal with it,” he said. “We need the private sector, civil society and we need foundations.”

Pilosio’s Building Peace Awards demonstrate a more direct approach to communicating and networking with clients and stakeholders. The firm has cut out all exhibitions except one, preferring to communicate its ethos and culture directly through this event.
For Pilosio CEO Dario Roustayan, the awards are an important way to connect with clients and strengthen the business; the combination of altruism and marketing make perfect sense: “What we are doing here is only possible and sustainable if we have a successful business,” he said.

Pilosio also used the event to reveal its ‘Shelters for Refugees’ project. Working with Habitat for Humanity founder, architect Cameron Sinclair, the firm has developed buildings for refugees constructed of scaffolding tubes and local materials such as sand or gravel.

“We felt the need to become stakeholders, to do something concrete,” said Routsayan.

With the possibility of combining the ‘L’ shaped units to create single homes, communities and buildings such as schools or clinics, the first two pilot school projects are already planned for a refugee camp in Jordan. The idea is that the structures can be dismantled at the end of a camp’s life and used to rebuild homes and community facilities in the refugees’ home countries.

The event also included a panel discussion of five influential women identified as Builders of Peace. These included Carolyn Miles, CEO of Save the Children, Khalida Brohl founder of the Sughar Empowerment Society which fights honour killings in Pakistan and Salini Costruttori board member and Poste Italiane chairman Luisa Todini.

Pilosio’s approach was very well-received among guests, with Tarek Al-Nassar, managing director of Arabian Roots Scaffolding taking to the stage to praise both Roustayan and Pilosio’s leadership.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Towards sustainable mobility
    April 12, 2012
    Tony Marshall, Director at Arup, looks at ways in which the company encourages sustainable mobility.From policy and systems development through to the design and execution of major infrastructure projects, he reviews Arup's global project experiences and research programmes. Space on roads throughout the modern world is decreasing as the volume of cars and road users increases. How can mobility be safeguarded without compromising quality of life or environmental well-being? As engineers, we have a responsib
  • Towards sustainable mobility
    February 20, 2012
    Tony Marshall, Director at Arup, looks at ways in which the company encourages sustainable mobility. From policy and systems development through to the design and execution of major infrastructure projects, he reviews Arup's global project experiences and research programmes
  • Transylvanian motorway breaks new ground in engineering
    July 11, 2012
    Normally in hilly ground, we would use the excavated soil from the cuttings to fill the valleys," says Bogdan Sgarcitu, External Affairs Manager of construction company Bechtel. "But on this stretch the clay-like soil cannot be compacted, so we've had to use many more piles than normal: in just three months we installed more than 500, some drilled as deep as 24m. We've also had to transport millions of tonnes of materials over some less-than-perfect infrastructure."
  • Fast bridge building in Tennessee
    July 5, 2016
    The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) recently completed the Fast Fix 8 bridge project in Nashville, with help from a Power Curbers slipformer belonging to Irwin Concrete Construction. TDOT’s goal was to replace eight ageing interstate bridges along Interstate 40 through Nashville using a process called Accelerated Bridge Construction (ABC). This uses fast-paced, around-the-clock work to limit road closures and speed up bridge completion, impacting surrounding communities as little as possibl