In January Nestlé announced that it will invest up to CHF 2 billion to lead the shift from virgin plastics to food-grade recycled plastics and to accelerate the development of innovative sustainable packaging solutions.

Building on its 2018 commitment to make 100% of its packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025, Nestlé will reduce its use of virgin plastics by one third in the same period whilst working with others to advance the circular economy and endeavor to clean up plastic waste from oceans, lakes and rivers.

Food quality and safety are paramount, and packaging plays a major role in assuring this. Most plastics are difficult to recycle for food packaging, leading to a limited supply of food-grade recycled plastics. To create a market, Nestlé is therefore committed to sourcing up to 2 million metric tons of food-grade recycled plastics and allocating more than CHF 1.5 billion to pay a premium for these materials between now and 2025. Nestlé will seek operational efficiencies to keep this initiative earnings neutral.

Packaging innovation, including new materials, refill systems and recycling solutions, is another key challenge on the path towards a waste-free future. In addition to its significant inhouse research through the Nestlé Institute of Packaging Sciences, the company will launch a CHF 250 million sustainable packaging venture fund to invest in start-up companies that focus on these areas.

These two initiatives come in addition to Nestlé’s major ongoing efforts in research, sourcing and manufacturing to make its packaging recyclable or reusable and contribute to its goal to achieve zero net greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. As part of the company’s packaging commitment and to increase transparency, Nestlé will continue to outline further initiatives and provide regular progress updates.

“No plastic should end up in landfill or as litter,” said Mark Schneider, CEO of Nestlé. “Making recycled plastics safe for food is an enormous challenge for our industry. That is why in addition to minimizing plastics use and collecting waste, we want to close the loop and make more plastics infinitely recyclable. We are taking bold steps to create a wider market for food-grade recycled plastics and boost innovation in the packaging industry. We welcome others to join us on this journey.”

“We are pleased to see Nestlé commit a CHF 2 billion investment toward creating a circular economy for plastics, alongside a reduction of its use of virgin plastic in packaging by one third by 2025. By eliminating the plastics we don’t need, innovating in areas like reuse models and new materials, and circulating the plastics we do need — also in more challenging food grade applications — we can create an economy where plastic never becomes waste. Achieving the commitments announced today will significantly contribute towards realizing this vision,” said Andrew Morlet, CEO, Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

Please find the official press release on nestle.com

Mid-February saw over 500 delegates gather in Copenhagen for the Daikin VRV Summit, where the company outlined the major advances put in place to lower the environmental impact of climate control systems, in support of its goal to achieve CO2 neutrality by 2050. Daikin’s business partners were also introduced to a range of new products and initiatives including the high efficiency, low GWP Daikin mini VRV 5 and the pioneering L∞P by Daikin scheme which reuses refrigerant for new VRV systems.

Creating a sustainable future together

Reflecting the Summit’s focus on sustainability theme, Copenhagen – named ‘Europe’s Green Capital’ in 2014 – was the aptly chosen venue, where delegates enjoyed the full ‘Green Experience’. This involved going completely paperless, as well as the use of local public transportation and locally sourced food. All CO₂ emissions resulting from participants’ arrivals and departures were offset by Daikin, making this a fully carbon neutral event. The donations for the offset go to a project in Rajasthan, India, to support farmers who send their harvest waste to a biomass plant for power generation. reducing CO₂ emissions and generating more jobs in the region.

Under the umbrella theme of ‘Creating a sustainable future together’, the Summit explored a wide variety of products and services that contribute to reducing CO₂ emissions and avoid the depletion of natural resources, through a series of informative lectures, workshops and displays.

New products such as the new VRV 5 with over 70% lower GWP, the adoption of a circular economy through the reuse of refrigerant and the use of intelligent controls such as the Daikin Cloud were among recent innovations profiled by Daikin.

 “On the one hand, we have reduced our own CO₂ footprint and on the other we are putting on the market solutions that reduce the CO₂ footprint of our customers. The key visual representing the VRV Summit consists of three leaves, which together highlight the three most important fields of action: innovation, circular economy and smart control.” – explained Bernard Dehertogh, head of commercial DX products at Daikin Europe.

Exclusive CEO Breakfast organized by BASF Hungary

As a company investing in making our economy fit for the future, BASF is dedicated to support sustainable development globally, in Europe and also in Hungary. On the sidelines of the visit of former BASF EMEA president, Prof. Dr. Markus Kramer to Hungary on Dec 10th 2019, BASF Hungary organized an exclusive CEO business breakfast with the participation of Csaba Kőrösi, the Head of Directorate for Environmental Sustainability at the Office of the President of Hungary and H.E. Elizabeth Ellison-Kramer Ambassador of the Republic of Austria to Hungary. The host of the event was Dr. Thomas Narbeshuber, the leader of Country Cluster South-Central Europe (EUN/S). The business breakfast focused on concrete actions along with highlighting the importance of the legislative framework, and welcomed CEOs from Hungarian, German and international companies as well as many other local partners of BASF besides the representatives of the most important policital decision maker bodies, such as the Ministry for Innovation and Technology. After the presentation of Mr. Csaba Kőrösi and Prof. Dr. Kramer, a panel discussion was held featuring the keynote speakers as well as Dale Martin (Siemens), Anita Simon (Alteo) and Ekkehard Philipp (Fox Automotive).

As it was stated in the title of the event, the presentations and the panel discussion focused on how sustainability is reshaping business and how decision makers can or should cope with this fundamental transformation.

In his presentation, Mr. Csaba Kőrösi gave an insight on global sustainability developments and drew a sustainability vision for Hungary. In his view, sustainability cannot be regarded separate from economic and social developments but needs to consider all aspects. Therefore, we need to set new priorities, develop plans and change rules, institutions and mechanisms.

„The world (including the business scene) is currently in the largest transformation we have ever embarked on, much bigger than the industrial revolution was. The traditional perception is prompting that we shall have the current system continuing, we add some more money for sustainable solutions and that additional money will save our lives and businesses. But this is wrong.” – said Mr. Kőrösi. „The markets are undergoing a trajectory change nowadays. We need to reconsider our economic activities with careful view to the overall balance of all assets, including the social, human, natural, built and financial capitals. The integrated approach is inevitably redefining and will restructure markets. In the upcoming 15 years, USD 90-100 trillion of investment is expected to come into projects, solutions, new technologies if we really want to achieve our agreed sustainability goals. In 20 years, 40% of the global GDP will be generated by companies that do not exist today or are still in embryonic forms. There will be new winners and new losers. Where do we want to be as countries or companies? The time is now to decide.” – he added.

Representing the business, Prof. Dr. Markus Kramer called the political decision makers to action. He stated that industry has a huge role in shaping the future of mankind, but business alone cannot solve the problem, optimal framework is needed for fulfilling the needs of the society.

In his closing sentences the host of the event, Dr. Thomas Narbeshuber, pointed out that for reaching our common goals that were expressed in the speeches and the panel discussion, open, non-dogmatic dialogues like this are needed much more often. This is why BASF Hungary organizes forums and events for stakeholders with the topic sustainability regularly.

As a result of the 3-level assessment process Tungsram has won in the “Common affairs,common responsibility” category for it’s  Future Talents training program as well as in the “Soul of CSR-Internal CSR solutions” category awarded for  Volunteer programs and Fittungsram employee health-program.

Joerg Bauer the President&CEO of Tungsram has thanked the participants of the programs and the CSR leadership.In the Future Talents program of Tungsram 90 high school students receive almost 600 hours of English classes and 100 hours of labour market training at the Tungsram plants: Hajdúböszörmény, Kisvárda, Nagykanizsa, Zalaegerszeg and Budapest.

In 2018 Tungsram volunteers had helped local communities with 12,000 hours of work, with 150 participants and 100 programs while the Fittungsram health-program had contributed to the health of the colleagues with 30 events and 30 free medical screenings besides several preventive and mental health-promoting programs. The winners can use the trademark of CSR Hungary of their responsible corporate operations for 2 years.  The patron of the event was Minister of Innovation and Technology Hungary dr. László Palkovics. The Deputy Secretary of State for sustainable development Ferenc Hizó was participating on the event. He said: “It is a great success if an enterprise  recognizes that enforcing economic interests and making efforts towards sustainable development and growth are not excluding, but rather complementing each other.”

We congratulate the winners of the categories in the name of Tungsram!

• Syngenta dedicates $2 billion over five years to innovation specifically targeted at delivering a step change in agricultural sustainability
• CEO Erik Fyrwald announced the market launch of two technological breakthroughs a year at the Sustainability Summit in New York
• Syngenta will reduce the carbon intensity of the company’s operations by 50 percent by 2030, to support the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change

In mid-October Syngenta announced $2 billion will be spent over the next five years to help farmers prepare for and tackle the increasing threats posed by climate change. The investment supports a new Syngenta sustainability goal of delivering at least two technological breakthroughs to market each year, to reduce agriculture’s contribution to climate change, harness its mitigation capacity, and help the food system stay within planetary boundaries. Erik Fyrwald, Chief Executive Officer at Syngenta also announced that the investment in research and development for sustainable agriculture will be matched by a drive to reduce the carbon intensity of the company’s operations by at least 50% by 2030 to support the ambitious goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change. Syngenta’s commitment has been validated and endorsed by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi).

“Agriculture is now at the front line of global efforts to tackle climate change,” said Mr Fyrwald. “Syngenta is committed to accelerating our innovation to find better and ever safer solutions to address the shared challenge of climate change and biodiversity loss.” “These aren’t just words, this is real action that will drive focus in Syngenta to help farmers tackle climate change and reduce the sector’s contribution to the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.” The $2 billion will be directed towards programs with clearly differentiated benefits or breakthrough technologies that will enable a step change in agricultural sustainability, such as land use, soil health and integrated pest management.

The targets form part of Syngenta’s Accelerating Innovation commitment launched earlier this year to address the increased challenges faced by farmers because of climate change, soil erosion and biodiversity loss. Progress against these targets will be reported annually and independently audited. The announcement was in large part informed by the completion of 150 listening sessions around the globe – including Hungary as well – to help the company’s leaders identify priority areas for investment.