Introduction
In the 200 years of Royal Smit & Zoon’s history, 2022 has probably been one of the most challenging. The Russia-Ukraine war, with its direct impact on raw materials, energy, and inflation, and the continued Covid-19 lockdowns in China significantly impacted our business and our customers. Despite the global turmoil, we kept true to our mission to ‘Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Leather Value Chain, together’, spanning Environmental (E), Social (S), and Governance (G) dimensions. ESG is at the core of our strategy and critical to ensuring continuity for our family-owned business.
In 2022, we made progress in some important projects: We were proud to maintain the EcoVadis Gold rating, next to achieving ISO certification for all our production and logistics sites. We maintained and expanded our portfolio of Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC) level 3 certified products and implemented the first step of our multi-year training program on the Employee Code of Conduct. Strong efforts were dedicated to several education and community involvement initiatives, demonstrating our thought leadership. With our profound belief in the ‘Power of Partnerships’, we continued our involvement in key industry networks and organizations, including Leather Working Group, Sustainable Leather Foundation, ZDHC, and Leather Naturally. A fully sustainable leather value chain can only be achieved through collaboration and with the support of all stakeholders.
“Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Leather Value Chain, together.”
As a provider of sustainable solutions to the industry, we were pleased to experience an ever-growing interest and adoption of Zeology, our chrome, heavy metal, and aldehyde-free tanning agent. In addition, new product introductions within the remit of our strategy were done, like lignin-modified re-tanning agents, biopolymers based on sugar beet pectins, and environmental and performance-optimized retanning products. Please check our websites for more solutions and information.
This year has also been one reflection – how do we continuously keep improving our ESG roadmap toward 2025? How do we continue to drive progress and transformative action across the entire leather value chain?
There are mounting stakeholder expectations on private sector ESG performance, requiring full transparency and traceability on the environmental and social impacts across supply chains. Climate change is a defining issue, directly impacting the food system that we (and our business) depend on. This impact must be matched with a collective sense of responsibility, stressing the need for carbon footprint reduction at all levels. This is felt extra strongly in the context of an unprecedented number of new laws and regulations raising the bar.
Keeping pace with the constantly evolving ESG landscape, stakeholder expectations, and regulatory requirements while using our ongoing ESG Roadmap targets for 2025 as a basis, we will update our ESG Strategy and sharpen our targets in the coming year. Our mission will remain to ‘Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Value Chain, together’. Because one thing is for sure: We can only make progress by continuing to collaborate with you, our partners and stakeholders. Please ask yourself ‘how it can be done together‘ and consider this a sincere invitation to engage with us about what you have read. Your feedback is very valuable to us, as it supports us in this journey.
Marc Smit
CEO Royal Smit & Zoon
Keeping pace with the constantly evolving ESG landscape, stakeholder expectations, and regulatory requirements while using our ongoing ESG Roadmap targets for 2025 as a basis, we will update our ESG Strategy and sharpen our targets in the coming year. Our mission will remain to ‘Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Value Chain, together’. Because one thing is for sure: We can only make progress by continuing to collaborate with you, our partners and stakeholders. Please ask yourself ‘how it can be done together‘ and consider this a sincere invitation to engage with us about what you have read. Your feedback is very valuable to us, as it supports us in this journey.
Marc Smit
CEO Royal Smit & Zoon
There are mounting stakeholder expectations on private sector ESG performance, requiring full transparency and traceability on the environmental and social impacts across supply chains. Climate change is a defining issue, directly impacting the food system that we (and our business) depend on. This impact must be matched with a collective sense of responsibility, stressing the need for carbon footprint reduction at all levels. This is felt extra strongly in the context of an unprecedented number of new laws and regulations raising the bar.
As a provider of sustainable solutions to the industry, we were pleased to experience an ever-growing interest and adoption of Zeology, our chrome, heavy metal, and aldehyde-free tanning agent. In addition, new product introductions within the remit of our strategy were done, like lignin-modified re-tanning agents, biopolymers based on sugar beet pectins, and environmental and performance-optimized retanning products. Please check our websites for more solutions and information.
This year has also been one reflection – how do we continuously keep improving our ESG roadmap toward 2025? How do we continue to drive progress and transformative action across the entire leather value chain?
“Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Leather Value Chain, together.”
In 2022, we made progress in some important projects: We were proud to maintain the EcoVadis Gold rating, next to achieving ISO certification for all our production and logistics sites. We maintained and expanded our portfolio of Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC) level 3 certified products and implemented the first step of our multi-year training program on the Employee Code of Conduct. Strong efforts were dedicated to several education and community involvement initiatives, demonstrating our thought leadership. With our profound belief in the ‘Power of Partnerships’, we continued our involvement in key industry networks and organizations, including Leather Working Group, Sustainable Leather Foundation, ZDHC, and Leather Naturally. A fully sustainable leather value chain can only be achieved through collaboration and with the support of all stakeholders.
In the 200 years of Royal Smit & Zoon’s history, 2022 has probably been one of the most challenging. The Russia-Ukraine war, with its direct impact on raw materials, energy, and inflation, and the continued Covid-19 lockdowns in China significantly impacted our business and our customers. Despite the global turmoil, we kept true to our mission to ‘Create a Socially and Environmentally Sustainable Leather Value Chain, together’, spanning Environmental (E), Social (S), and Governance (G) dimensions. ESG is at the core of our strategy and critical to ensuring continuity for our family-owned business.