Business News

Epson Releases Sustainability Report 2010

Tuesday 27. July 2010 - Seiko Epson Corporation ("Epson", TSE: 6724) today released its Sustainability Report 2010, detailing the business, environmental and CSR initiatives undertaken by the Epson Group in fiscal 2009 (April 2009 - March 2010) as it works toward becoming a truly sustainable enterprise. For the second year, the Sustainability Report will be released in digital form only on the corporate website.

Epson promotes transparency and publicly discloses a wide range of relevant information as part of efforts to build and maintain the trust of its stakeholders. As one aspect of that, Epson began publishing an Environment Report in 1999 to provide details regarding its environmental conservation measures. In 2003, Epson added information on social-related programs to this Environmental Report and renamed it the Sustainability Report.
This year’s Sustainability Report contains two feature sections detailing how Epson aims to achieve its SE15 Long-Range Corporate Vision, announced in March 2009. The first feature, “Create, Produce and Deliver”, looks at Epson’s “customer value creation process” from the perspectives of customer satisfaction, quality assurance, and sales & marketing. The second feature reports on the SE15 Mid-Term Environmental Policy, which spells out the milestone environmental goals for 2015 as the Company works toward realization of its Environmental Vision 2050, announced in Brussels in 2008. This section also highlights Epson’s biodiversity initiatives ahead of the Conference of the Parties (COP 10) to be held in Nagoya, Japan, in October 2010 – the International Year for Biodiversity.
Fiscal 2009 Environmental Initiatives*1

Global warming prevention
On a per unit of sales basis, Epson’s emissions of global warming substances showed a consolidated global reduction of 51.2% compared with fiscal 1990 levels, against the target 50% reduction, and a decrease in energy use within Japan of 44.8% (target of 35%).
Resource recycling and conservation
88.9% of products in designated categories met the 75% recyclability rate*2 target, and 98.9% achieved the 85% recoverability rate*3 goal, by weight.
Epson also succeeded in reducing its waste emissions by 2,800 tons, or 8%, over fiscal 2008.
Chemical substances management
Epson has been able to cut its PRTR emissions by 53.5% and reduce its VOC emissions by 38% compared with benchmark fiscal 2005 levels through the introduction of alternatives and initiatives to reduce usage.
Environmental accounting
In fiscal 2009, Epson’s investment in environmental conservation was 560 million yen, and expenses totaled 5.85 billion yen, with environmental R&D comprising 2.83 billion yen (48%). Of those R&D expenses, 73.6% went to the development of eco-considerate products, demonstrating Epson’s commitment in this area. (The environmental accounting system encompasses Seiko Epson and a total of 38 affiliates; 18 in Japan and 20 in other regions).

Fiscal 2009 Societal Initiatives*1

Corporate citizenship expenditures
Epson’s Philosophy and Policy for Philanthropy and Giving, established in 2004, identify five priority areas of engagement, and corporate expenditures in fiscal 2009 totaled nearly 660 million yen.

Sustainable procurement
Working with suppliers on socially responsible procurement is a key activity for ensuring Epson Group standards are maintained up the supply chain. In FY2009, Epson transferred responsibility for procurement from general administrative departments to those in charge of production strategy to bolster the procurement system and make it more effective.
In addition, Epson evaluated self-assessments of approximately 330 suppliers and performed on-site audits at 130 suppliers to ensure understanding of and compliance with the Supplier Code of Conduct.
“Epson has a long standing tradition of corporate and environmental responsibility,” said Masahiro Koyama, General Administrative Manager of the Trust-Based Management Office. “Epson works to fulfill its corporate social responsibility by practicing trust-based management, whereby the efforts of every employee are focused on building confidence in Epson as a company. It is this ongoing, Group-wide commitment to CSR that is reflected in external appraisals and rankings, such as the Silver Class status awarded to Epson in the SAM Sustainability Yearbook 2010.”
*1 The information concerning community and societal activities covers Seiko Epson and 97 of its domestic and overseas affiliates, while information about environmental activities has been collated for Seiko Epson and 74 Epson Group companies.
*2 Recyclability rate refers to material recycling.
*3 Recoverability rate includes material and thermal recycling.