2022 Sustainability Report
Silvateam’s commitment and respect for human beings and the environment
The principle of sustainability is an integral part of Silvateam’s culture and history, representing the driving force of continuous improvement processes across all areas of the company. The respect for these principles is fundamental in ensuring continuity of results and gives essential added value in the process of development and improvement of our production.
Corporate social responsibility
For more than 160 years, Silvateam has evolved and developed, ultimately becoming an international company.
This growth has always been accompanied by a steady commitment to the social welfare of the communities, near the company’s facilities in Argentina, Italy, and Peru, as well as socially responsible activities for all the shareholders.
Silvateam’s commitment to social progress has different models and it is translated into many specific actions:
- Maximum focus on people and the professional and social growth of its employees
- Improvements in workplace safety
- Respect for the environment
- Open dialogue with the suppliers
- Knowledge of and listening to our customers in order to better fulfill their requirements
Respect for the environment
Safeguarding the ecosystem is an integral part of Silvateam’s search for sustainable excellence.
For this reason, the company always operates in compliance with environmental and legal requirements, minimising the ecological impact of the entire productive process: from the quebracho forests in Argentina to the Tara plantations in the Andean mountains, from the Piedmont chestnut woods to the manufacturing plants where the different raw materials are processed and marketed around the world.
The residues resulting from the tannin extraction are used by Silvateam as biomass in the production of thermal and electrical energy in biomass power plants. Also derived from the chestnut wood residues, Silvateam produces and sells pellets, under the registered brand name Bruciabene®, which are free from chemical additives and bleaching and binding agents.
The goals of Silvateam are the following:
- Reduction in the environmental impact of its activities
- Continuous improvement of its environmental performance
- Protection of ecosystems and biodiversity
- Continuous improvement of the efficiency of management systems
Our Mission introduced by our CEO Fabrizio Donegà
In order to grow and improve, a goal-setting attitude is needed. We all do it, whether it’s getting better grades in school, running faster, climbing higher, looking after loved ones, tending the garden or volunteering, one way or another we give ourselves targets.
Silvateam likes to set itself goals and strives to achieve them. It does this by devising new products, reaching new markets, and improving its economic and financial performance. It achieves this through a structured approach of outlining a five-year plan including investments, market expansion and R&D targets, and key technical and economic performance indicators.
We align our team to these same objectives through communicating and sharing our vision and we share our plans with financial institutions and our stakeholders, so they have a clear picture of where Silvateam is going and how it’s getting there.
With this document, Silvateam addresses sustainability issues in the same manner. We want to integrate our growth and development plan with our sustainability goals. Our goals are SMART, like the ones we use for our internal incentive programmes: S for for specific, well-defined, clear; M for measurable with indices and numbers; A for ambitious but achievable; R for related to the characteristics of our business and T for temporally defined with evaluated and self-imposed deadlines.
These are goals that stem from Silvateam's belief that consistent growth can be achieved by combining development, efficiency, environmental impact reduction, involvement, and organisation.
We started with a snapshot of where we stood after nearly 170 years of history. Last year we produced our first sustainable development report and we have since crystallised our performance in ESG terms using the internationally recognised GRI criteria as our guidelines.
Drawing upon the experience gained through generations of planning and successfully managing complex situations, Silvateam has associated a set of objectives to each of its investments. These objectives go beyond mere production capacity or plant replacement and include innovation, reduction in resource consumption, increased efficiency, improved environmental performance, and improved working conditions.
At the same time, Silvateam has set clear objectives in managing its relationships with stakeholders, whether its own employees or the companies that collaborate directly or indirectly with the company, the communities surrounding its industrial facilities, customers, suppliers, and public entities with whom we cooperate.
We are conscious of the fact that a company with a history such as ours has long-established practices, but we have formalised our procedures and processes so as to adapt to those modern governance practices typical of structured companies. All of this without forgetting that we are a dynamic company and that formalising the rules should not mean excessive bureaucracy or rigidity in processes, but rather taking the opportunity to make them clear and more efficient.
Making our goals public automatically becomes a commitment. A commitment that everyone at Silvateam wish to honor!
Fabrizio Donegà
CEO
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