TOKYO, Nov. 11, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Astellas Pharma Inc. (Tokyo:4503,"Astellas") announced today that it is signing the United Nations Global Compact(1), which will further reinforce the company's commitment to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and ethical business practices around the world.

"We are committed to adopting the Global Compact and its 10 principles, further integrating them into the culture and day-to-day operations of our company and through Astellas' annual CSR Report(2) and other communications, we will make this commitment clear to our stakeholders and the general public," said Astellas President and CEO Yoshihiko Hatanaka. He added, "We believe joining the UN Global Compact highlights our CSR-based management which we are promoting to implement our raison d'etre of 'contributing toward the health of people around the world through the provision of innovative and reliable pharmaceutical products.'"

(1) Global Compact (GP): GP is the world's largest corporate social responsibility initiative to implement the companies' sustainable growth. The United Nations GC asks companies to embrace, support and enact, within their sphere of influence, a set of 10 principles in areas regarding corporate social responsibility of human rights, labour standards, the environment and anti-corruption.

The United Nations Global Compact 10 Principles are as follows:

Human Rights

• Principle 2: Make sure that they are not complicit in human rights abuses.
• Principle 1: Businesses should support and respect the protection of internationally proclaimed human rights; and

Labour Standards

• Principle 6: The elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation. -- Principle 5: The effective abolition of child labour; and
• Principle 4: The elimination of all forms of forced and compulsory labour; -- Principle 3: Businesses should uphold the freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining;

Environment

• Principle 9: Encourage the development and diffusion of environmentally friendly technologies. -- Principle 8: Undertake initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility; and
• Principle 7: Businesses should support a precautionary approach to environmental challenges;

Anti-Corruption

• Principle 10: Businesses should work against corruption in all its forms, including extortion and bribery.

(2) CSR Report (http://www.astellas.com/en/corporate/csr/report.html)