Innovation

Cemex is considered one of the most responsible and successful companies in Mexico. Full of innovation in many of its projects that are part of its business model.

Always guided by its mission to "Create sustained value by providing industry-leading products and solutions to meet the construction needs of our customers around the world."

Its business model is innovative because it focuses on its clients, stakeholders, and alliances, planning strategies focused on sustainability, creating this value that makes it outstanding. Successful companies orient their business model to stakeholders rather than just profitability, but Cemex has given it the extra plus by seeking sustainability.

The "Construyo Contigo" project reflects this value and innovation. It focuses on the community, seeks to support communities, committing to them so that they live better. It focuses on supporting people to get a decent home, increasing the impact of its products and its influence on people. It is made up of four programs that form a comprehensive community development model, generating positive impacts on the most vulnerable communities in the country.

Well, it is not only that it wants to help communities philanthropically, first of all, but Cemex is also a business; it needs to effectively manage its income and expenses to stay afloat and continue developing these projects. That is why this project is based on alliances and strategies.

Strategically, the communities where the project will be carried out are selected, they help, but do not give away, allies are sought, contribute in part. Still, the others must contribute something they seek to learn, to promote sustainable development over time.

In the hypothetical case that Cemex disappears tomorrow, all the communities where it applied its project will remain afloat. It will continue to develop because they learned how to do it, and thanks to the community workshops, they joined as a society. Together they will continue with that development. We clearly see how this project is oriented to SDG 11. Sustainable communities and cities, SDG 8. Decent work and economic growth, SDG 9. Industry, innovation, and infrastructure.

The Advisor on social responsibility and sustainable development, Gloria Noemí Cárdenas Salazar, told us that this project's vision was conceived 25 years ago. Still, the foundations were born by the devastation of communities in Monterrey by a hurricane, for their values and humanity decided to support the communities. Still, by the very way of being of the company in which its business model is based on alliances, they realized that it was not enough to donate cement or materials; the real challenge was for these communities to rise, learn to get ahead, develop resilience. Therefore, it began with workshops that trained the residents, workshops where activities were carried out so that they could relate to each other, society was supported, skills were developed, and community development was created.

Today we have this project called "Construyo Contigo," focusing on community infrastructure, construction, which seeks to place cement in communities that need it, leaving returns to the company and supporting society's sustainable development.

The individual programs are as follows: "YoConstruyo", "Centros Productivos de Auto Empleo", "ConstruApoyo" and "Talleres Comunitarios".

For Gloria Noemí Cárdenas Salazar, this project is of great value and very significant; the positive impact it leaves on people is noticeable; she mentions:

"I build with you is a very noble project, very social and very strategic for the company," "We contribute to the development of people, and it is something that transcends time."

Inspiration

The idea was born from the disaster caused by Hurricane Alex, which devastated the homes and infrastructures of many communities in the region, leaving thousands of people affected; with that event, people sought shelter, support, or help from the government or large companies to be able to recover everything that the hurricane had taken away from them, CEMEX as an exemplary company sought to help more than just offering materials, they knew the situation of these people, therefore, only offering them the material as the vast majority of other companies would never be there The only answer is that, apart from providing the resources for the reconstruction of the affected areas, they offered help from various specialists in different areas to develop the community, educate it and create the value of resilience among its inhabitants.

From the construction of this project, it is that they had to continue developing the technologies, techniques, and methods that they implemented so that they could support the communities in the development of their infrastructure through training, support, and placement of resources, in this cement case, without ceasing to be a business in addition to being able to obtain a social and community development approach. Therefore, with their ideal of always looking for a better way of doing things, they created the 4 programs to meet their objectives, while they aligned these goals with the United Nations SDGs. In other words, what motivated them to develop this great project together with its innovations was to fulfill its objective of being an innovative company that focuses on social and environmental issues, applying governance, relationship and sustainability issues, to support and develop their neighboring communities, without their work affecting them, in short, they seek to be the best neighbor and ally of communities that are most in need.

Overall impact

These projects are a great benefit in the social aspect, since they impact on the improvement of the quality of life of people by helping them to generate, either, knowledge and training regarding construction, or creating activities that promote the social integration between people, or finally that people can produce their own building materials, people who probably would not otherwise be able to get this kind of services, materials. This class of projects improves a community by creating a better environment for people while allowing people to generate new knowledge, and this can also be implemented with knowledge regarding an environmental improvement at the time of construction and how to do it correctly without generating such a large footprint, apart from the fact that CEMEX has other projects directly related to the environment. The company implements this kind of involvement so that the community advances and grows together with the company in the future.

Business benefit

Through the implementation of Construyo Contigo, at the same time as many other innovation programs, CEMEX has managed not only to help different communities in different areas but also to position itself as one of the companies with the greatest social impact in Mexico, as already we know with the program I Build with you, they raise money while helping low-income people to build their homes, but at the same time, they become more popular among people, thus causing an increase in their sales and increasing the scope and coverage of their services throughout the country, thus demonstrating the different benefits that its innovations provide.

Social and environmental benefit

The Construyo-Contigo project clearly reflects the support and benefit at the social level since the same program consists of a social housing initiative that supports public-private partnerships and bases its self-construction process on developing and improving capacities and skills. Together, all members of a community can collaborate in the process of building homes with sustainability criteria. The division of this project into the 4 programs “YoConstruyo,” “Centros Productivos de Autoempleo,” “ConstruApoyo” and “Talleres Comunitarios” greatly reinforces the development and social support with training programs and advice on housing construction, the inclusion of machinery and resources for collective work in the community, a fun card for the acquisition of materials and the promotion of social integration among families to strengthen a safe environment in the community.

In the words of the Advisor on social responsibility and sustainable development Gloria Noemí Cárdenas Salazar, the “Construyo-Contigo” project involves a wide series of projects depending on the company's strategy but which must always be focused on social and environmental aspects. An important point that this company carries out with this project on social issues is that it maintains and increases the satisfaction of the community's well-being with its work process since, quoting verbatim, “There is a concept called a social license, you can have all your permits are in order, but if your neighboring community is not happy because it is perceiving that you are affecting it in a way from its community, its children and its family, it can stop your business.” Based on this premise, CEMEX has contributed and improved more and more in its sustainability projects to become “the best neighbor” of support for the community.

Finally, for a more specific complement, in the construction of houses, among the resources offered to people are equipment for houses to generate environmentally friendly homes using clean technology and basic services such as stoves or lighting low-cost, among much more, always with the focus of reducing emissions and taking advantage of resources to generate an efficient circular economy.

Interviews

Virgilio Barrera Guerra, CEMEX Mérida Plant Operations Director

Gloria Noemí Cárdenas Salazar, Social responsibility and sustainable development advisor