Since 2017, March has been ‘B Corp Month’, dedicated to celebrating and raising awareness of a young, but already established global movement (the B Corp movement), born out of a revolutionary idea: using business as a force for good.
For centuries, our society has been founded on a divisive, exploitative economy, driven by profit without regard for the consequences.. This led to the results we know today: ever-deepening social divides, destroyed ecosystems, global warming and catastrophic climate change. Hence the need for a drastic change of direction that puts the focus back on people and the environment.
Being a B Corp company means sharing this new vision of doing business: generating profit while creating shared value for the community and the environment. Chiesi Group immediately embraced this vision. We are convinced that a different business model exists and that companies can truly be a positive force, rather than merely extracting shared resources for the benefit of a few.
Based on this philosophy, Chiesi changed it’s legal form to a Benefit Corporation in Italy, the US and France. Further in 2019, it obtained B Corp certification from B Lab[1]a natural step in line with our group’s values: putting people first, accountability, transparency, and a sense of community and sustainability.
2022 we were recertifiedas a B Corp, confirming that we are on the right track. The certification process requires us to measure our performance every three years using the B Impact Assessment, an internationally recognised tool that stringently evaluates a company’s operations and impact on the environment, society, its employees, local communities and external stakeholders, while identifying areas for improvement.
For Chiesi, being a B Corp means evaluating its present and identifying new steps towards the future. Not with words, but with actions. We have set ourselves concrete targets: zero emissions by 2030 for direct and indirect GHG emissions from electricity and heat purchases (GHG Protocol Scopes 1 and 2) and by 2035 for all other indirect emissions (GHG Protocol Scope 3).
As a company involved in the treatment of chronic respiratory diseases, a large part of our impact comes from the climate-changing effect of propellant gases. We have invested in a re-engineering process with the introduction of a new propellant with low global warming potential and subsequent new clinical development on the patient. The process has already yielded the first positive results in the two phase 1 trials, and will be completed by 2025 with an investment of €350 million. But that is not enough.
Our entire value chain and our suppliers play a key role in our sustainability journey. With the goal of creating a sustainable ecosystem, we worked with our suppliers to create our first code of conduct, the Code of Interdependence. For us, sustainability means involving everyone, valuing diversity and using it as a strength.
[1] A US non-profit organisation founded in 2006 by Jay Coen Gilbert, Bart Houlahan and Andrew Kassoy, three friends who believed in ‘revolution’.
