Krones can be doubly pleased with this year’s EcoVadis rating: The supplier to the global food and beverage industry has once again earned the coveted gold medal – significantly improving its overall result for the fourth year running. With 78 out of a possible 100 points (previous year: 72), the group ranks among the top two percent of companies in its industry.

The group’s executive board was pleased but not particularly surprised by the good news. “The entire Krones team has worked incredibly hard over the past several years, investing great effort, passion and innovative vigor into our company’s sustainable transformation,” says chief executive officer Christoph Klenk. “We are pursuing a rigorous strategy in all three dimensions of ESG, each with precisely formulated medium and long-term targets. In that respect, the EcoVadis rating objectively reflects our own understanding of our group’s continuing evolution.”

That is due in part to the fact that Krones has learned how to use the EcoVadis scorecard as an effective tool for development, as Peter Steger, Head of Corporate Sustainability, explains, “The annual scorecard gives us – and of course our stakeholders – a highly transparent view of which measures have yielded improvements in our ESG performance and where we still have work to do. We can then use this knowledge to initiate targeted optimization measures and fine-tune our processes.”

Points gained despite tighter rules

As an example, the company has since the 2023 rating adopted a group-wide climate and environmental policy and optimized its procurement processes. In addition, by appointing local sustainability coordinators in the various Krones regions, the company has lent additional support to the implementation of the group-wide ESG strategy. These actions are reflected in the current rating’s higher score – and that despite the fact that EcoVadis once again tightened its assessment criteria considerably this year. Krones’ biggest progress came in the “sustainable procurement” category. The company’s “environment” score also improved further.

The team expects the group-wide commitment to achieving net zero emissions to yield further scorecard gains. Under this commitment, the group intends to reduce greenhouse gas emissions along its entire value chain by 90 percent by 2040 and to offset the remaining ten percent. This reduction target has been submitted to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), and validation is expected to be completed in October 2024.

Background

EcoVadis is a globally recognized rating agency that assesses companies’ sustainability performance, focusing on 21 sustainability criteria across four themes: environment, labor and human rights, ethics and sustainable procurement. The Krones Group has been listed with EcoVadis since 2017. It shares its scorecard with over 125 customers, from small and mid-sized enterprises right through to multinational conglomerates. In its own sustainability strategy, Krones has committed to twelve Environment, Social, Governance (ESG) goals.