Feike Sijbesma, CEO and Chairman of the DSM managing Board, commented: “We are very proud to once again be amongst the global leaders in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. We congratulate AkzoNobel on being named the leader in the cluster. At DSM, we vigorously pursue the opportunities throughout our company to further integrate sustainability into everything we do. As a business growth driver based on our core values, sustainability is a key element in delivering on our mission to create brighter lives for people today and generations to come, providing products and solutions that make a positive contribution to meeting global challenges, and creating value for all our stakeholders.”
DSM is playing a leading role in the People dimension of Triple P, with its People+ strategy and approach. People+ is DSM’s program to develop solutions that measurably improve the lives of consumers, employees and communities. DSM developed a People Life Cycle Assessment (People LCA) to assess the social impact of DSM products, from raw materials extraction to end-of-life disposal. It is DSM’s ambition to standardize its methodology and create a harmonized, broadly supported framework together with industry peers. To this end, DSM plays a prominent role in the Roundtable for Product Social Metrics, a collaboration of twelve multi-industry market-leading companies. The group has recently published product social impact metrics designed to enable organizations to quantify and consequently structurally steer the social impact of their operations, i.e. how they impact people’s daily lives. This type of actionable insight and the associated targets that organizations set themselves have been instrumental to the radical improvements companies have made to their environmental performance over recent years.
DSM aims to increase the share of ECO+ solutions (products that offer clear ecological benefits versus the mainstream solutions they compete with) towards 50% of total sales by 2015 and above 80% in innovation. H1 ECO+ results were well on track to meet these 2015 goals with ECO+ shares in running business topping 45% and realizing above 90% in the innovation pipeline. Promising new innovations in H1 were DSM Dyneema force multiplier technology and DSM-Niaga new venture, which focuses on closing the carpet materials loop thanks to its unique mono-material technology.
On the 3rd of September, together with joint venture-partner POET, DSM celebrated the official opening of the Project LIBERTY cellulosic bio-ethanol facility in Emmetsburg, USA. Using advanced biotechnology developed by DSM’s research scientists, this is one of the first commercial-scale plants in the world to utilize agricultural ‘waste’ products (in this case corn crop residues) to produce advanced cellulosic bio-ethanol, and marks a significant step in the further development and adoption of renewable, bio-based fuel sources as the world looks for alternatives to fossil fuels.