Specialty chemicals company LANXESS placed first in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) Europe and second in the DJSI World.
Lanxess placed first in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) Europe in the “Chemicals” category – scoring 87 out of 100 points – and came in second place in the DJSI World. The Group achieved particularly good results in the areas of product stewardship, management of water related risks and human rights.
The Dow Jones Sustainability Indices evaluate economically relevant ESG (Environment, Social and Governance) factors once a year. The DJSI World lists the best 10% of the global companies evaluated per sector, while the DJSI Europe lists the best 20% of companies headquartered in Europe.
“We want to play an active role in the transformation of the economy and global value chains towards a more sustainable world,” said Hubert Fink, member of the Board of Management of LANXESS AG. “We consider the renewed very good ranking in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index as proof of the success of our efforts.”
Two years ago, LANXESS published its plan on how to become climate-neutral by 2040. In 2020, the company also committed to reducing water withdrawals at sites in areas with particularly high water stress by 15% by 2023.
In addition, LANXESS has pledged to further improve the sustainability performance of its product portfolio, to eliminate critical substances in products and to develop safe alternatives. The company has also committed not to market any new chemical end products that contain critical substances in a concentration of more than 0.1%.
In addition to voluntary commitments, LANXESS is focusing on incentive systems for greater sustainability, particularly a new compensation system for the Board of Management that has been in place since the beginning of the year. Roughly one-third of the variable compensation is linked to the company’s sustainability performance. Specifically, the company's performance in climate protection and occupational safety will be factored into the system for 2021.