As a pioneer in the field of sustainability, Henkel wants to drive new solutions for sustainable progress and develop its business responsibly and economically successfully. This encompasses all of our company's activities – along the entire value chain.
Sustainability
2030+ Sustainability Ambition Framework
Henkel’s sustainability strategy is a direct reflection of the company’s commitment to “Purposeful Growth”. We are committed to creating more value for our stakeholders, developing our business responsibly and successfully, and building on our leading role in sustainability.
Our sustainability strategy revolves around implementing our ambitions through concrete measures and projects. With our 2030+ Sustainability Ambition Framework, we have developed long-term ambitions in the three dimensions of Regenerative Planet, Thriving Communities and Trusted Partner.
Regenerative Planet
We are on a journey toward an environmental transformation of our business model. To achieve this ambition, we intend to transform our processes, products and use of raw materials in the direction of a resource-efficient, net-zero future. We are focusing on climate change mitigation measures, a functional circular economy, and the protection of nature and biodiversity.
Climate
Become a net-zero business by decarbonizing our operations and raw materials.
- Henkel has defined a net-zero plan that goes hand in hand with extended targets for reducing emissions along the value chain.
- To reach net-zero, Henkel commits to the following targets, which were validated by the Science-Based Target initiative (SBTi):
- reduction of absolute Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 42 percent by 2030 (base year: 2021)
- reduction of absolute Scope 3 GHG emissions by 30 percent by 2030 (base year: 2021)
- reduction of absolute Scope 1, 2 and 3 GHG emissions by 90 percent by 2045 (base year: 2021).
- To mitigate direct emissions at its own sites, Henkel will continue to increase its energy efficiency and cover the remaining energy needs more and more with renewable energy sources. The share of purchased electricity that Henkel obtains from renewable sources is already at 89 percent worldwide.
Circular Economy
Advance circularity through our products, packaging and technologies.
Our ambitions & targets for packaging
- 100 percent of Henkel’s packaging is designed and developed to optimize recyclability or reusability by 2025.*
- We aim to reduce the amount of virgin plastics from fossil sources in our consumer products by 50 percent by 2025. We will achieve this by increasing the proportion of recycled plastic to more than 30 percent and reducing the volume of virgin plastic.
- We want to continuously help ensure that all packaging waste is properly disposed of and recycled, thereby preventing it from entering the environment. In order to achieve this, we are supporting waste collection and recycling initiatives. We are investing in innovative solutions and technologies that support improved infrastructure and consumer information to drive the recycling process.
By the end of 2023, 87 percent of Henkel's packaging was already designed for recycling or reuse*. The proportion of recycled plastic in its consumer goods packaging was 19 percent globally.
Initiatives and partnerships
Progress towards sustainability in packaging is only possible if companies along the entire value chain work together. Therefore, Henkel is engaged in various partnerships and cross-industry initiatives. A few examples:
- We participate in the New Plastics Economy initiative of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, which brings together stakeholders to rethink the future of plastics and provide ideas to foster a circular economy.
- In the Plastic Waste Coalition of Action, which was formed from the Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) in 2020, Henkel is working with other companies on the basis of Golden Design Rules to develop a more circular approach to the design and processing of plastic packaging in the consumer goods industry.
- Henkel is also an active supporter of the "Business Coalition for a Global Plastics Treaty" of the UN Treaty on Plastic Pollution. Together with more than 170 other global companies, we are in a multi-stakeholder process for a global agreement on the sustainable use, recovery and recycling of plastics.
Nature
Protect and restore biodiversity with a focus on forests, land and water, and ensure responsible resource stewardship:
- We are committed to sourcing our raw materials sustainably and not through deforestation. Our goal is to prevent the deforestation of primary and secondary forests with significant ecological value.
- One of our palm oil targets by 2025 is to cover 100 percent of our requirements with oils whose responsible sourcing is certified or externally confirmed. In fiscal year 2023, we sourced 96 percent of our total demand for palm oil and palm kernel oil as well as the derivatives, which are primarily used by Henkel, as certified raw materials in accordance with the RSPO mass balance model.
- In addition, we have set ourselves the goal of reducing water consumption per ton of product by 35 percent by 2025. By the end of 2023, we had saved 24 percent.
Thriving Communities
We do everything we can to help people live better lives. Our social responsibility is to promote equity, strengthen diversity and respect human rights. We offer our employees lifelong learning opportunities,
and an attractive and healthy working environment. We advocate for social progress and access to education worldwide, and we provide assistance in emergency situations.
Equity
Strengthen diversity, equity and inclusion, respect human rights and enhance the livelihoods of people:
- We are convinced that a diversified workforce, as well as an open and appreciative corporate culture, are important success factors in a globalized world.
- Our goal is to continuously increase the ratio of women in the company at all levels, and we have the ambition to achieve gender parity across all management levels by 2025. The share of women in management positions was at 39.5 percent in 2023.
- Additionally, we want to improve livelihoods of smallholder farmers. Since 2013, we have worked with the development organization Solidaridad on respective initiatives in Ghana, Honduras, Indonesia, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua and Nigeria.
Education
Support lifelong learning and education, and motivate people to take action for sustainability:
- We want to further promote our employees' commitment to sustainability and offer extensive trainings as part of our holistic engagement program „Sustainability at Heart“.
- In addition, we are committed to further expand our community education programs and volunteering. We have already exceeded our overarching goal of reaching 30 million people by 2030 as part of this commitment (base year 2010).
Wellbeing
Foster health and wellbeing and help drive social progress:
- We promote the health of our employees to help create an agile, high-performance organization. To do so, we rely on globally uniform health and safety standards, and provide health and preventive care programs. As a key objective of our sustainability strategy, we aim to reach more than 90 percent of our employees worldwide.
- We remain focused on our long-term objective of zero accidents and want to improve our occupational safety by 60 percent by the end of 2025 compared to 2010. In 2023, we recorded 0.7 occupational incidents per million hours worked by our employees. This is an improvement of 42 percent over the base year 2010.
Trusted Partner
We draw on our value-oriented corporate culture and our scientific and technological expertise to strengthen our performance while maintaining our integrity. We deliver safe and best-in-class product and technology solutions to our customers and consumers. We integrate sustainability in our portfolio and in our business processes and provide transparent reporting on this to our stakeholders.
Performance
Reliably deliver best-in-class product performance and chemical safety as the foundation of our business success:
- Our ambition is for every new product to make a contribution to sustainability.
- Our goal for 2030 is to triple the value created relative to the environmental footprint of our operations.
Transparency
Integrate sustainability into our business governance with transparent reporting, disclosure and engagement:
- One of our palm oil targets for 2025 is full transparency and traceability for palm (kernel) oil. In 2023, we were able to maintain the traceability rate at 89 percent up to the mill and increase it to 52 percent up to the plantation as part of a survey on the transparency of our supply chains for palm-based ingredients.
- We strive to measure the sustainable transformation of our product portfolio. Our Adhesive Technologies business unit published audited results in 2023 to assess the sustainability of its product portfolio. Our Consumer Brands business sector is working on a similar process to assess the portfolio in the consumer goods area.
- We also achieved excellent results in ESG ratings in 2023, including the Sustainalytics and EcoVadis ratings, in which Henkel is among the top 1 percent of rated companies.
Collaboration
Scale sustainability impact with our partners, leading to responsible business practices in our supply chains:
- 100 percent responsible sourcing together with our partners is our ongoing ambition. Around 97 percent of our purchasing volume in the areas of packaging, raw materials and contract manufacturers is covered by our responsible sourcing process.
- As a founding member of the industry initiative "Together for Sustainability" (TfS), Henkel has contributed to the development of a Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) guideline that enables suppliers and companies to jointly calculate their carbon footprint and thus contribute to the decarbonization of the chemical industry. In 2023, TfS piloted an IT platform that allows upstream PCFs to be shared.
*Excluding products where ingredients or residue may affect recyclability or pollute recycling streams.
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