Green esteem

An award-winning CSR strategy has set the ambition to brew a better world

Vocal artist Blaxtar interpreted HEINEKEN’s Sustainability Report 2015

 

You do not win a European Excellence Award and the EU Sustainable Energy Award plus make it in the ranking of Fortune's Change the World top 50 companies every year... So when the team at HEINEKEN achieved these independent recognitions in 2016, we took a moment to reflect on some of the learnings and success factors on our ongoing green journey.

Business imperative

Any sustainability agenda, which is not firmly embedded in the business strategy, won’t be sustainable in itself. HEINEKEN’s CSR strategy is called Brewing a Better World. In 2010, we determined what this strategy should aim at. We started off by engaging with various stakeholder groups and asked them what they believed was relevant for a worldwide leading brewer like us. But we also identified several CSR drivers which directly or indirectly impact our profit and loss statement. Think of eco-efficiency, risk mitigation as well as our licence to operate and new business opportunities. In other words, we went beyond an altruistic or reputational rationale only to pursue a full-fledged sustainability agenda.

Take the Göss brewery in Austria as an example. Göss is the first carbon-neutral brewery in the world with a capacity of more than one million hectoliters of beer annually. First, we designed a more efficient way of brewing our local beer, i.e. using less energy. Second, we completely replaced fossil fuel in our production with renewable energy. Consequently, we became independent from the risk of future oil price fluctuations, as well as from government measures, which might be imposed at some point following on from COP21.

Under the Brewing a Better World umbrella, we have identified several CSR pillars. Each area relates closely to what we do, from "barley to bar", to reduce emissions and water use, to increase the percentage of sustainably sourced raw materials and to promote the responsible consumption of our beers. Even more important, we have defined a number of clear and tangible targets for each pillar. We monitor our progress as part of the ongoing governance cycle, including an internal reporting system as well as the annual external disclosure – which will be soon through our integrated annual report.

Eventually, the business imperative of Brewing a Better World is also manifested as one of the company’s strategic priorities, i.e. “Embed sustainability in our business”. For us this is crucial in driving our CSR agenda internally and externally.

Stakeholder crossover

Our CSR partnerships aspire to "1+1=3". Partnerships are increasingly an opportunity to drive Brewing a Better World. Many of today’s CSR challenges have grown too big for being resolved by one player or sector only. Conversely, 1+1=3 means that any partnership we engage in should create a benefit that goes beyond what the partners could achieve by working independently, alongside each other.

"Any sustainability agenda, which is not firmly embedded in the business strategy, won’t be sustainable in itself."

Take our partnership with the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO). Deploying water stewardship initiatives around those 23 breweries which operate in water-scarce areas is one of our priority cooperation platforms. The availability of clean water with the purest quality is key for brewing our beers. Yet sustainable watersheds are essential for local communities, too. Working with UNIDO has actually accelerated our water stewardship initiatives in countries such as Ethiopia, Indonesia and Nigeria. The UN act as an unbiased broker, they invite all relevant players to local workshops which they conduct to generate necessary action for long-term sustainability. They also utilise their network to governments and international finance and donor organisations to endorse and enable such action.

In the past three years, we have set up partnerships with customers, NGOs and IGOs to boost our Brewing a Better World strategy. In Africa, we work closely with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and with EUCORD, a specialised NGO, to introduce local sourcing programmes that help farmers improve their knowledge and skills. With international retailer DIA, we run a joint responsible consumption programme, which aims at consumers and employees in Spain and Portugal. With the expert support of Shift (a non-profit centre of expertise on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights), we have started to develop a special Human Rights Due Diligence process.

The common denominator for these partnerships is the nature of contribution from each party. Mutual funding might be involved, but this is not the key success factor. We rather look at ways to amplify our networks or to apply shared knowledge, respectively.

Innovative communications

A sustainability report is not exactly considered a page-turner. With this in mind, we approached rapper and spoken word artist, Kevin “Blaxtar” de Randamie, for his video interpretation of our CSR activities in 2015. Public reaction went way beyond what we had hoped for. The news was covered by basically every specialist media. The clip was also a trending topic on social media. Not to mention the positive reaction from stakeholders.

And we didn’t stop there.

Brands play a crucial role in every company’s CSR journey from good to great. Brands are equipped to amplify your CSR message much more than any corporate communication ever could. Think of the different alcohol moderation campaigns for Heineken®. Or initiatives to highlight renewable energy, which we harness for brewing our beers.

Within the HEINEKEN universe, we link an increasing number of brands to the more than 50,000 solar panels in our brewery and wholesale locations worldwide. For those brands we have developed the tagline #BrewedByTheSun. The slogan is displayed on the labels and in advertising. Moreover, we wanted to address millennials in particular. Therefore, we invited YouTuber Ben Brown to discover how brands such as Tiger® in Singapore and Gösser® in Austria are being brewed using solar energy. Those vlogs have been watched by millions of viewers.

Admittedly, those examples are just the tip of the iceberg comprising infinite opportunities to unleash CSR creativity. We continue to learn, course correct where necessary and demonstrate that a sustainable business is a successful business. And it’s not only serving a great cause; it’s also so much fun to explore.


European Excellence AwardsThis campaign won the 2016 European Excellence Awards category "Corporate Responsibility". To find out more about the awards, head to the Excellence Awards website.

Michael Dickstein

Michael Dickstein is director of global sustainable development at HEINEKEN International. He is a corporate relations professional with a passion for strategic CSR management, stakeholder engagement, post-merger integration and crisis management. Previously, Michael was corporate relations manager at HEINEKEN Netherlands. During his tenure, the Dutch business launched various sustainability initiatives as well as partnerships with health organisations and local governments. Michael joined HEINEKEN ten years ago from Brau Union where he was head of communication and investor relations.