Long-time activist Sat Santokh Singh Khalsa, founder of Rainforest Cereals, established the awards in 1994.

Awards are granted to up to five companies or individuals that have demonstrated excellence in integrating social responsibility in multiple aspects of their businesses. The contestants are judged in six categories of equal weight, with the highest total scores being the winners. The categories are: Community Involvement, Education, Health, Employee Empowerment, Environment, and Sourcing. The criteria have been adapted from guidelines established by the Social Venture Network in a document titled, “Standards of Corporate Social Responsibility,” which is available at the SVN website, http://www.svn.org/initiatives/standards.html or you can download the document Here.(PDF Doc. 230k)
 
The annual Socially Responsible Business Awards (SRBA) event, traditionally held each fall at the Natural Products Expo East www.newhope.com, is sponsored by Golden Temple, manufacturer of Peace Cereals, and Yogi Tea. Golden Temple is joining forces with other key leaders in the natural products industry to recognize and honor companies and individuals that have been exceptional in promoting and practicing socially responsible business. The Socially Responsible Business Awards encourage and promote understanding, appreciation, and expanded trade dialogue within the natural products business community regarding socially responsible business practices.

The nominations process is an open one--nominations are gathered from industry members via the nominations form elsewhere on this site. Nominees are asked to submit samples of their product(s) (where relevant) in its primary and secondary packaging and cases along with at least a paragraph and no more than one page of text on each of the above six categories citing objective evidence of the nominee’s socially responsible performance. If more that one page of text per category is submitted, the Award Committee members will only review the first page.

Co-sponsors are eligible for consideration as Socially Responsible Business Award candidates as we have developed an impartial third-party, award-selection process. We made the decision to develop such a process as we found that companies concerned enough to wish to co-sponsor the Breakfast were frequently excellent candidates for awards, and we did not wish to require companies to have to choose between being a sponsor or being an award candidate.

Judges and last year’s winners of the award are ineligible for nomination.