Fujitsu Services and the Environment

From Lauraibm

Revision as of 13:40, 9 July 2007

Summary

What the Vendor says about itself

Environmental Policy

The Fujitsu Group recognizes that environmental protection is a vitally important business issue. By utilizing our technological expertise in the IT industry and our creative talents, we seek to contribute to the promotion of sustainable development. In addition, while observing all environmental regulations in our business operations, we are actively pursuing environmental protection activities on our own initiative. Through our individual and collective actions, we will continuously strive to safeguard a rich natural environment for future generations.

Principles:

• We strive to reduce the environmental impact of our products throughout the product lifecycle
• We are committed to conserving energy and natural resources, and practice a 3R approach (reduce, reuse, recycle) to create best-of-breed eco-friendly products.
• We seek to reduce risks to human health and the environment from the use of harmful chemical substances or waste.
• Through our IT products and solutions, we help customers reduce the environmental impact of their activities and improve environmental efficiency.
• We disclose environment-related information on our business activities, products and services, and we utilize the resulting feedback to critique ourselves in order to further improve our environmental programs.
• We encourage our employees to work to improve the environment, bearing in mind the impact of their business activities and their civic responsibilities.

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Fujitsu Group Sustainability Report

Going green, Saving the environment

Although many companies view environmentalism as a luxury rather than a necessity, here's an electronic giant that thinks otherwise Article is written by Chuah Khai Lin. Reproduced courtesy of AboutWe Pte Ltd

A leader in the IT industry, Fujitsu is harnessing its technologies and creativity to contribute to sustainable development. Fujitsu attaches great importance to the environmental compatibility of its products. This end-toend strategy spans the entire lifecycle of the products, from development to the selection of materials and production, right through to recycling.

"Preserving the Earth is among the most pressing issues faced by the human race. We at Fujitsu are practicing environmental management in our day-to-day operations because we feel that responding to environmental issues is a prerequisite for management. I firmly believe that the essence of environmental management boils down to actions taken by individual employees who are aware of their responsibilities as citizens of Earth" stressed Mr Naoyuki Akikusa, Chairman of Fujitsu Ltd, in one of his key speeches.

Based on the principle of "Manufacturing in Harmony with Nature’, Fujitsu has been actively pursuing environmental activities since its establishment. Their environmental programmes include the establishment of zero-emission plants, the creation of eco-friendly products, introduction of environmental technologies, implementation of an environmental management system and environmental accounting.

Environmental Certification ISO 14001 Fujitsu has also implemented an environmental management system in compliance with ISO 14001 as the basis for all of its business operation. In March 2004, Fujitsu’s corporate office as well as the Sales and Soft Service division were given the ISO14001 certification. This entire ISO certification activity involved about 48,000 employees, making it Japan’s largest single ISO certification.

Overcoming obstacles

As expected, embarking on this green journey is not an easy task. Some of the obstacles Fujitsu faced were - difficulties to quantify and assess the positive environmental impact of Fujitsu’s environmental activities, and replacing of hazardous substances in some of Fujitsu’s parts. Fujitsu overcame the former by developing environmental indicators at an early stage. In fact, they are the first to promote the use of indicators with environmental efficiency factor calculation method to assess environmental improvement effects quantitatively. Fujitsu is also involved in the Eco-efficiency Examination Committee sponsored by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) to develop a new approach for a specialised environmental indicator called the Eco-efficiency Factor. The Eco-efficiency Factor will be used to measure the delivery of competitively priced products and services that are able to satisfy consumer needs while progressively reducing ecological impacts and resource consumption throughout the life cycle of the product. With that in place, Fujitsu will be able to evaluate environmental burdens and service performance of existing products, plus measure any relative improvements in any upcoming products. As for replacement of hazardous substances in some of Fujitsu’s products, Fujitsu overcame it by making some significant changes in the production process.

Green Life 21 At Fujitsu, the corporation takes their responsibilities very seriously, both locally and around the world. The organisation aims to put into practice the highest possible environmental standards by implementing programs such as "Green Life 21" with the slogan "Focused on the Green". This initiative observes the 21st century environmental awareness activities, defines environmental objectives and sets extremely high standards for all Fujitsu companies to follow.

Through "Green Life 21", Fujitsu places "Green Earth" as the core and dissect the environmental activities into three areas: "Green Products", "Green Factories", and "Green Solutions". "Green Management" is set as the base of all these activities.

Reforestation projects in Southeast Asia To extend their environmental efforts beyond factory operations, the Fujitsu Eco Club was established in June 2001. The purpose of this club is to help employees promote and organise voluntary environmental activities. Fujitsu placed very heavy emphasis on enlisting every employee’s voluntary participation to protect the green Earth.

For the past several years, Fujitsu has been conducting reforestation projects in Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia. In 2002, the Fujitsu Group Malaysia Eco-Forest Park in Sabah, East Malaysia was opened. The project is being funded through the contributions and volunteer activities of executives, employees, the workers union and many others from the Fujitsu Group, which totals more than 10,000 people. Once the forestation is completed, administration of the park will be transferred to Sabah Forestry Development Authority. The entire area will be designated as "eco-forest park’ and will be use for environmental studies and eco-tourism. In Vietnam, 200,000 trees were planted and it is estimated to have absorbed CO2 approximately equivalent to the amount generated by 571 households in 2002.

The 3Rs - Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Even consumers are not left out in their quest for a greener environment. Fujitsu installed a comprehensive recycling programme for customers, whereby old computers and notebooks are collected, disassembled and recycled using Fujitsu’s recycling centres around Japan. In the year 2002, Fujitsu collected an amazing12,380 tonnes of recycled products and achieved a resources reuse rate of 84.1%. This result represented a decline of 1% in the resources reuse rate compared with the preceding year due to a rise in the volume of waste plastic consisting unidentified materials collected. To rectify this problem, more identification machines for plastic waste materials will be installed.

Today there is increasing global recognition of the need to address the environmental burden created by the disposal of computer and consumer electronics products. Taking into consideration trends in environmental regulation outside Japan and varying conditions of each country, Fujitsu will be establishing recycling systems in Europe by the end of fiscal 2004 and in North America and Asia by the end of fiscal 2006. So, it won’t be too long from now to see a Fujitsu recycling scheme in your neighbourhood.

Recognition & Awards In recognition of their environmental efforts in reforestation activities and superior environment-related technology, Fujitsu has received numerous awards and commendations. Some of the awards Fujitsu had garnered over the years include FTSE4 Good Global Index, 2002 Resources Circulation Technology and System Recognition and Top Ten Workplaces in Philippines Region IV, just to name a few.

Fujitsu has definitely set a very good example for many giant corporations out there. As you can see, being environmentally friendly isn’t just for the tree huggers - it’s for everyone who wants to make a positive change for the future generations.

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Source

• 1. Environmental Policy

• 2. Article on Fujitsu and the Environment