Mr. Stefan Doboczky
CEO, Lenzing Group/Robert van de Kerkhof, CCO, Lenzing Group
What does sustainability mean for the global fiber market?
Doboczky: Sustainability is a key growth driver in the entire industry. The global fiber market is developing positively due to favorable macroeconomic conditions and the increasingly important issue of sustainability. Accordingly, the Lenzing Group is operating in a growth environment. In particular, we benefit from the good eco-footprint of our products.
What does sustainability mean for the Lenzing Group?
Doboczky: The sustainability strategy of the Lenzing Group is firmly embedded in the corporate strategy “sCore TEN“ as published in the autumn of 2015. sCore TEN stands for profitable growth on the basis of producing environmentally compatible specialty fibers and defines sustainability as a key corporate value. Sustainability is an integral part of all organizational functions across the company and is considered in all strategic and business decisions.
Lenzing fibers are made from wood – how important is sustainable sourcing of wood and pulp for the Lenzing Group?
Wood-based and renewable fibers are our business, i.e. sustainable sourcing is absolute key!
Climate protection and responsible purchasing, especially of our renewable raw material wood, comprise key issues in Lenzing’s sustainability efforts. Our customers turn increasingly to raw materials that do not cause any unnecessary burden to the environment, neither at the beginning nor at the end of product life.
Mr. Van de Kerkhof
CCO, Lenzing Group
What does sustainability mean for the Lenzing Group?
Sustainability is of vital strategic importance to Lenzing on two different levels. On the one hand, as a company we strive to achieve a balance between the three cornerstones i.e. People, Planet and Profit. We aim to do business in a way that Lenzing’s business operations and products create more benefits for the society, environment and the economy than the impacts they cause. On the other hand, sustainability is a crucial growth driver for us, and in particular an objective of our research, as demonstrated by the ecological footprint of new products.
Life-cycle thinking is an essential part of Lenzing’s sustainable approach and contributes to improve the environmental footprint of the final textile and nonwoven products. This approach supports transparency and supply-chain traceability, thus mitigating risks for our value-chain partners and ourselves.”
What does this mean for your products and customers?
The large textile and fashion brands which we supply are always on the lookout for something new. They want innovations with regard to ecological and social sustainability. Thanks to our products we are able to fulfill these demands. A recent consumer survey concluded that Lenzing Modal® and our lyocell fiber TENCEL® are closely associated with sustainability. For example our flagship product TENCEL ® uses 20 times less water and considerably less land than cotton and has a significantly better footprint than comparable fibers. This is the kind of innovation our customers are looking for.
Lenzing fibers are made from wood – how important is sustainable sourcing of wood and pulp for the Lenzing Group?
The Lenzing Group has comprehensive certifications on the natural origin of our raw material. All our standard fibers boast the prestigious USDA Biobased label, certifying their natural origin.
Lenzing is clearly committed to avoiding the use of wood and pulp from ancient and endangered forests, and has been able to verify its sustainable procurement practices for years on the basis of recognized certifications. A range of other labels certifies our fibers’ biodegradability and compostability – so the Lenzing fibers originate from nature and finally turn back into nature..
