Contributing to the Solution of Environmental Problems through Business Operations in the Field of Water and the Environment
The Kurita Group has been conducting business in the field of water and the environment for 62 years since its foundation. Professor Katsuhiko Kokubu of Kobe University's Graduate School of Business Administration, who is an expert in environmentally sustainable management, talked with President Toshiyuki Nakai of Kurita Water Industries Ltd. about the future direction of the Group.
Ensuring Business Continuity to Fulfill Our Social Responsibility
Kokubu:The Great East Japan Earthquake caused tremendous damage to the Tohoku region mainly and also to Japan's economy. From the viewpoint of CSR, it is essential for companies to ensure business continuity in the event of disasters. What impact did the earthquake have on the Kurita Group's operations?
Nakai:Before talking about the Kurita Group, I would like to offer my prayers for the souls of those who lost their lives and express my sympathies for those who lost loved ones in the disaster as well as victims who survived.
Within the Kurita Group, fortunately no one was injured and no serious damage was caused to our facilities. We have long been taking measures to ensure business continuity, regarding it as a priority in our risk management efforts, and based on the experience we had in the mega earthquake, we are reviewing these measures as an issue to be urgently tackled.
Kokubu:In ensuring business continuity you need to focus on the supply chain as an important factor. What measures did you implement to restore the supply chain and support your customers?
Nakai:Many of our customers suffered serious damage to their manufacturing facilities and equipment, and the entire Kurita Group has been working to support them and help them recover. Specifically, in our water treatment chemicals business, we have been striving to manufacture and deliver our products to customers in a stable manner while in the water treatment facilities business we have been making efforts to restore water treatment facilities at customers' factories, thereby helping them resume operations as early as possible.
Moreover we have donated products such as packaged drinking water to areas afflicted by the earthquake and also provided seawater desalination equipment to help supply water for daily life use to evacuation centers.
Kokubu:From the viewpoint of environmentally sustainable management, I think it is very important for companies to contribute to the recovery through their business operations.
Nakai:Factories cannot manufacture products without water even if their facilities have been restored. Electricity cannot be generated without water either, because major power generation facilities use steam to drive turbines. The earthquake has made us re-recognize the importance of water, which provides the basis of the Kurita Group, and also the significance of the social role to be played by the Group as an enterprise conducting business in the field of water and the environment.
Aiming to Achieve the Corporate Vision, "Becoming an Advanced Water and Environmental Management Company"
Kokubu:In your capacity as president, what challenges do you think the Kurita Group should meet in fostering environmentally sustainable management?
Nakai:In our environmental improvement activities, we are not only reducing our own environmental impact but also endeavoring to help customers reduce their environmental impact through the development of new products and technologies that will contribute to reducing environmental impact. This is a very unique feature of our activities.
As for our own environmental impact reduction, we have been steadily conducting activities across the Group, but to further support customers' environmental improvement activities, to which we also attribute importance, we need to take global measures while encouraging Group companies to foster relevant measures.
Kokubu:It is important for Kurita Water Industries to expand the initiative to Group companies, but it must be difficult to actually foster such activities. You need to devise a good way to achieve this in consideration of the corporate culture and business details of the companies.
Nakai:In the water treatment chemicals business, we can apply the same system adopted by Kurita Water Industries also to Group companies, but in some of our business segments it is difficult to quantify the environmental benefits that we can bring to our customers. Nonetheless, most of our products, technologies, and services do help customers improve the environment, and it is necessary for us to build up a system that allows us to identify the environmental benefits that we can bring to customers for all the projects we propose.
Kokubu:What do you plan to do in regard to the global implementation of the initiative?
Nakai:We attribute importance to the expansion of our global business in our medium-term management plan. Due to power shortages as a result of the nuclear power plant disaster following the earthquake and tsunami, Japanese companies will likely accelerate the transfer of their factories from Japan to overseas. Accordingly, we must also globalize our measures to support our customers' environmental improvement activities. We must however note that parameters differ by country, including in regard to CO2 conversion factors used for electricity.
Kokubu:Perhaps you need to identify the environmental benefits that you can bring to your customers by country. Throughout the world, however, the need for water purification measures and to reuse water is as great as the need to reduce CO2 emissions. The Kurita Group has a wealth of technologies and products in the field of water and the environment and is highly committed to developing new products and technologies. By promoting the globalization of the initiative, I want the Kurita Group to tackle the higher target of improving the global environment as a whole, beyond the improvement of its customers' environment.
Nakai:I believe that we need to manage water so that water of appropriate quality and quantity is available whenever and wherever it is necessary, which will in turn help solve the global water problem. By implementing the corporate vision, "Becoming an Advanced Water and Environmental Management Company," we will continue to make contributions to society.
(Interviewed in July 2011)
