Social Responsibility

Meio Ambiente

The company sees the contribution for preserving natural resources not only as a duty, but also as an essential measure for the appreciation of its brand and its business. When adopting environmental measures, the company also identifies a market differential because of the increasing concern by consumers regarding ecological precepts and the preference by properties that allow for a greater contact with nature.

Gafisa S.A. and its subsidiaries comply with all legal determinations regarding environment and are engaged with their overcoming. They make a complete monitoring on impacts caused by their works, searching for options for reducing impacts and performing compensatory actions. This process begins with the licensing and goes on with monitoring and environmental projects, in addition to subsequent initiatives involving residents and nearby communities.

Among the adopted environmental measures, one of the most important ones is the selective collection in all offices and works. The idea is promoting the correct management of residues by means of reduction of the produced volume, the reuse of materials, the selective collection and, later, the recycling. Just like the 5S program, introduced in all units of the company, the selective collection results in works and areas that are cleaner and more organized.

The residues accumulated in construction areas are marketed and converted in premiums, directed to third-party workers working on them. The work engineer is responsible for contacting the selective collection company for scheduling the removal of materials, while the 5S mayor of each property trains the employees when he thinks this is needed, in addition to his promotion, raffle and delivery of premiums obtained with resources from the selective collection.

In AlphaVille properties, the program for selective collection of solid waste is made with the participation of cooperative workforces of materials collectors, so the nearby communities are provided with an alternative earning source.

The rational use of non-renewable resources is a priority in AlphaVille allotments, such as the basins for retaining rain water, adopted in a series of project in Paraná, Sao Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul, and systems of reuse of water for non-residential purposes in projects in Rio Grande do Norte and Sao Paulo.

In 2008, Gafisa intends to adopt the program Sustainable Work Area, which should conciliate several actions for suppressing the environmental impacts of its properties with the spreading of measures such as the use of recycled materials for confectioning the Work Area, the use of rain and percolation water and the use of gas for heating the shower. Some initiatives are already in course, such as the reuse of water for washing trucks and the work area itself.

Preservation areas
In AlphaVille properties, an average 4% of the work value is directed to the environment. The low demographic density characterizing projects makes green and preservation areas to have a high percentage of presence. In Santana do Parnaíba (SP), in AlphaVille Burle Marx, green and preservation areas represent 71% of the allotment. In Pinhais (PR), AlphaVille Graciosa maintains the largest Araucaria Reserve in urban area of the country, with green and preservation areas representing more than 1 million square meters, while the lots available for construction represent only 37% of total areas.

Sustainable solutions
One of the ways used for suppressing the environmental impact of the company activities is studying the adoption of new procedures and technologies ensuring the respect for nature during and after works.
The release, in 2007, of Eldorado Business Tower was a milestone in this sense. The work is pre-certified – the definitive acknowledgement should happen in the beginning of 2008 – and it will be the fourth property in the world to receive the label Leed® CS 2.0 Platinum (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), granted by the U.S. Green Building Council because of the set of sustainable solutions adopted in Sao Paulo property. The certification criteria were described with the collaboration of scientists, engineers and architects of the whole world, and the label is the most recognized for guidance and measurement of sustainable buildings. Nowadays, in addition to Gafisa building, there are just three other buildings in the world with such distinction.
In Eldorado, the implementation of new technologies allowed for an expressive reduction on the consumption of inputs like water and power, both during and after the conclusion of the work. While the average condominium expense in a building of the same standard is about BRL 15.00 per square meter, in the new property, this expense is reduced to the half.

Technologies
Among solutions adopted in Eldorado, there is the storage of condensation water from air conditioners and the collection of percolation water; the implementation of basins with dual flush valves with double switching on, allowing the user to control the water outflow; air conditioning by sectors, and degenerative braking technology, pioneer in Brazil, transferring the power spread by one descent elevator to another rising elevator. During the execution of the project, Gafisa employed 47% of raw materials from companies located in an 800-kilometer radius from Sao Paulo, contributing for the reduction of pollution agents. More over, the company added to the Owner Manual a chapter with tips for quotidian contributions to environment.
Gafisa has also created a study group comprising internal engineers for evaluating the feasibility of reproducing, in new residential properties, solutions adopted in Eldorado.

Recovery of degraded areas
In 2007, two special projects contributed to this concern. The first one was developed in Campo Grande (MS), where a city park was built for recovering the environment in the region affected by the property. An empty land, with 1.2 thousand meters in extension and 17 meters in depth, caused by the wrong execution of a pluvial gallery, was replaced by three lakes and 13.000 square meters of vegetation and trees, in addition to a Center for Environmental Education for kids and adults of the community. The BRL 2 million investment was shared with local owners. A similar action was made in Paço do Lumiar, in the metropolitan region of Sao Luís (MA). In the terrain where AlphaVille will deploy an allotment, a similar erosion was damaging the nearby mangrove. Without this project, the ecosystem could not be recovered, since rain water and landslides were sanding a large area of the mangrove.

Ações Sociais

The commitment to communities where the company is present is shown by means of a series of actions that contribute to the improvement of life quality of current and future generations. In 2007, the main corporative initiative was the Solidary Week, promoted in late November, in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, in which more than one hundred volunteers (collaborators and suppliers) were involved. Each measure taken on the Solidary Week was coordinated by a member of the Sustainability Committee, integrating collaborators and families in a Saturday full of activities. Such activities included: the recovery of common areas of Cézar Martinez State School, in Sao Paulo, and the Santa Rita de Cássia Orphanage, in Jacarepaguá, in Rio de Janeiro; donation of blood, planting of saplings; Christmas bags and collection of funds for Amigos do Bem NGO, in addition to the project Coloring the Work, an action undertaken in the pilot-work Paço das Águas.

Other initiatives were taken towards communities of regions near to properties in Sao Paulo. One of them was the recovery of Praça Acapulco, in Santo Amaro (south Sao Paulo), benefiting local residents with a leisure area. For children from school Miosótis and residents around the Miosótis properties, also in south Sao Paulo, clowns and the Cocoricó group, from a Brazilian television channel, performed their shows. The contest “What is magical for you?”, made among students of Elvira Brandão School, in Chácara Santo Antônio, gave educative toys and scholarships to authors of the three winning questions.

Fundação AlphaVille

Fundação AlphaVille was created back in 2000, with the mission of promoting the development of communities around the residential properties developed by the company. Projects privileged the social inclusion based on local talents and the sustainable handling of natural resources. The institution has its own director’s board, born out of the continuous involvement and commitment by the company regarding social and environmental causes. The entity developed a methodology of sustainable technology and elaborates its projects in a way that they can be managed, along time, by the communities themselves. In 2006 and early 2007, the Foundation created five new projects, in addition to the 32 projects already developed along seven years of existence.

• Bairro Escola AlphaVille Brasil (Barueri) – Developed as a partnership with the Associação Cidade Escola Aprendiz (City, School and Learner Association), it is focused on the education and development of communities, by way of strengthening of relationships between the community and the school. Squares, parks, alleys, museums, theatres and workshops, among other places, may be used as class rooms. The pilot-project was started in community Jardim Imperial, in Barueri, with the weekly service to 1.600 juveniles and kids. The experience is being extended to the city of Colombo (PR).
• Ecological Schools – Prompts a sustainable relationship between environment and community. The proposal is to engage kids and teenagers, making them multipliers of concepts, and to offer ecological and social guidance and education to communities.
• Committee for Democratic Computer Knowledge – Establishment of the Computer and Citizenship School in partnership with the NGO Committee for Democratic Computer Knowledge. It works with 200 people in Santana do Parnaíba and 150 people in Fortaleza.
• Computer Laboratories – Focused on the citizenship and computer formation of residents of Parque Imperial, in Barueri, benefiting the local youth. It is maintained in partnership with Barueri Social Fund, the Assinco Informática and the NGO Pensamento Digital. In addition to these initiatives, there are projects in cities of Colombo (metropolitan region of Curitiba - PR), Santana do Parnaíba (SP), Barueri (SP), Cotia (SP), Salvador (BA), Recife (PE), Fortaleza (CE) and Cuiabá.

Fundação AlphaVille also supports volunteer activities and the guidance of its collaborators about the preservation of the environment. With project Tô de Olho, in Sao Paulo office, there were reduction of 33% to the water consumption, 20.9% to power and 30% to paper use. During the Day to Make the Difference, 280 collaborators worked on projects for improving communities. In Curitiba (PR), activities included the reform of the playground, the external area and the computers rooms, in addition to the planting of trees and flowers in Graciosa Common Center. In Salvador (BA), improvements were made to the Common Center of Bairro da Paz. In Barueri (SP), the playground was reformed and the walls of the day care center Planeta Criança were painted. In Carapicuíba, the works included the reform of the refectory, the painting and fixing of the four playgrounds, the planting of the vegetable garden and the reform of the court from Santa Terezinha Shelter, where 156 children live.