Creating sustainable value for people and the planet
Sustainability is a hot topic – but not a new topic. People and organizations around the globe have been taking action to protect the environment and promote social progress for many, many years.
These efforts have gained momentum in recent decades, as the scale and urgency of the challenges involved have become increasingly clear. From the UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 through to the Fridays for Future movement, the last 30 years have seen a rapid increase in awareness about the need to protect our planet and its resources.
Our contribution to sustainability in 2020
Our people and teams made some outstanding contributions to sustainability during 2020 – despite the challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic. By working together, we were able to drive important progress with innovative products and projects that save resources and cut waste.
Highlights include:
- We launched several new products that respond to rising consumer expectations for natural and sustainable products in 2020. Our Nature Box and N.A.E. brands now offer shampoo and soap products that save water and reduce packaging, while we also expanded our Pro Nature range of household cleaning products and successfully introduced a cross-category sustainable brand called Love Nature. On top of this, our Loctite brand of adhesives developed a new technology that makes it possible to use paper instead of plastic packaging for a wide range of products.
- A new virtual power purchase agreement, signed in 2020, will now provide us with enough renewable energy to cover all of our sites in North America.
- And we became the first company to issue a plastic waste reduction bond, which is a sustainable financial instrument – with all proceeds invested into projects that reduce plastic waste.
Our targets for 2025 and beyond
We’re a sustainability leader, and we aim to pioneer new solutions for sustainable development and shape our business responsibly. In this spirit, we’ve introduced new sustainability targets for 2025 and beyond that will accelerate our efforts to create sustainable value for people, the planet and our business.
Click on the stripes to learn more about our targets.
- WE ARE COMMITTED TO BECOMING CLIMATE-POSITIVE
- WE ARE COMMITTED TO FOSTERING A CIRCULAR ECONOMY
- WE ARE COMMITTED TO ENHANCING OUR POSITIVE IMPACT ON COMMUNITIES
MILLION
TONS
BY 2025
BY 2025
BY 2025
EMPLOYEES
SOURCING
BY 2025
BY 2025
Our milestones from the last 30 years
The world has completely transformed in the last 30 years – and that change has been turbo-charged by the rise of computers, the internet and globalization. We’re now more connected than ever. As a result, people across the planet have a deeper understanding of the common challenges that we all face. Every person and organization has a role to play in responding to those challenges. And we’ll only succeed if we join together.
At Henkel, commitment to sustainability has been an integral part of our corporate culture for many decades. Our long track record of leadership in sustainability reaches all the way back to 1876, when Fritz Henkel founded our company. In 1992, we became one of the first companies in Germany to publish an environmental report. Last year, we published our 30th Sustainability Report. In the timeline below, you can see some of the key milestones from the last 30 years of sustainable development.