Companies in Singapore have been recognised for their efforts in sustainability. The Singapore Business Federation recently awarded 14 companies from a wide range of industries with the Singapore Sustainability Award for exemplifying Singapore’s business excellence in embracing sustainable practices. The award rewards companies for their effort in paying greater attention to inclusive growth whilst pursuing productivity and innovation improvements to underpin the competitiveness of their industries. Read more

Ricoh receives the Singapore Sustainability Award recognition

Singapore – Ricoh Asia Pacific Pte Ltd receives the Singapore Sustainability Award recognition under the Green Technology category presented by the Singapore Business Federation during the Singapore Sustainability Award Ceremony 2013. This award recognizes organizations for demonstrating strong and compelling green technology solutions, while ensuring a high level of commitment and performance to other criteria of corporate environment responsibility, measurement of impact and innovation.

Ricoh is the only organization in the office and printing solution industry to be awarded for its Quick Start-up (QSU) energy saving technology, which enables printers and copiers to start up quickly from the sleep mode. Since 2001, Ricoh has been constantly improving this technology – from 30 or more seconds to start up from energy saving mode, to reaching its current achievement of just 10 seconds. The development of energy saving technology is one of Ricoh’s positive contributing factors to CO2 reduction in the customer premises and thereby minimizes the environmental impact.

Ricoh stands firm on its three mottos – Never compromise on the environment, user-friendliness and quality, that differentiate its energy saving technologies from the rest.

“Ricoh is honoured and encouraged to receive this recognition from Singapore Business Federation as our continued effort in creating a sustainable environment for everyone has gained consensus. At Ricoh, development of environmental technologies is one of the most significant effort made to realize sustainable environmental management.” said Mr. Nobuaki Majima, Managing Director of Ricoh Asia Pacific Pte Ltd.

Ricoh’s sustainability commitment has stepped up to Corporate Shared Value (CSV) which focuses on three principles – Good for “Environment”, “Economy” and “People”. This new approach comes together with a clear objective of maintaining competitiveness to the customers’ benefits while promoting sustainable development.

Ricoh has been committed to sustainable environmental management back in 1970s. This commitment is put into practice throughout the product life cycle from product design, production, marketing activities and customer services to end-of-life product. Such practices reduce the environmental impacts, and at the same time, create economic value for the investors, clients and employees.

Source: www.ricoh-ap.com

Singapore Business Federation:

Singapore Business Federation recognises 14 organisations from a spectrum of industries exemplifying Singapore’s business excellence in embracing sustainable practices  •The Awards recognise enterprises across construction, infocomm, electronics, chemical, waste treatment, marine, oil and gas and industrial estate sectors with outstanding sustainability processes and initiatives.

•Reinforcing Singapore as a clean technology hub, the awards saw winning enterprises coming from diversified countries with regional headquarters in Singapore, UK, US, Netherlands, Japan, and Hong Kong etc

•A record of five SMEs (30% of winners) won the Singapore Sustainability Awards, which reflects a strengthening capabilities and depth of sustainable technological research amongst the SME business community

Fourteen organisations will be recognised this evening for their innovative sustainable business practices at the 2013 Singapore Sustainability Awards. An initiative of the Singapore Business Federation (SBF), the Awards are into their fourth season.

The winners were judged on their sustainability excellence and innovation by an independent panel of judges from Autodesk, Economic Development Board, IE Singapore, Institute of Technical Education, National Environment Agency, National University of Singapore, Singapore Compact for CSR, SIMTech, SPRING Singapore, and knowledge partners KPMG Advisory LLP and Frost & Sullivan. The winners will represent Singapore at international arena and be showcased at the China ASEAN Exposition 2014.

Comprising the Sustainable Business Awards (SBA) and the Green Technology Awards (GTA), this year’s top winners are:

Sustainable Business Awards (SBA):

•Top Honour (Large Enterprise segment): Keppel Land Limited

•Top Honour (Small & Medium Enterprise (SME) segment): ECO Special Waste Management Pte Ltd

Green Technology Awards (GTA):

•Top Honour (Large Enterprise segment): Panasonic Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd

•Top Honour (Small & Medium Enterprise (SME) segment): Greenpac (S) Pte Ltd

Held at Resorts World Sentosa, and graced by Mr. S. Iswaran, Minister, Prime Minister’s Office, Second Minister for Home Affairs and Second Minister for Trade and Industry, these companies were lauded for their sustainable business practices, pro-environment operations and performance management systems, corporate responsibility, innovation and green technology implementation.

In his opening remarks, SBF CEO, Mr. Ho Meng Kit noted that sustainability is intertwined with organisational success and has become a key criterion for a growing number of stakeholders when determining whether or not they wish to invest in or be associated with an organisation. Other issues are also expected to have as significant an impact on businesses – the way they operate, and the products and solutions in their offering.

Mr Ho shared that this year’s Singapore Sustainability Awards attracted quality submissions spanning a spectrum of industries from chemicals and paints to logistics, construction to marine and property to consumer products. “The award categories have been structured to emphasise on social and innovation aspects to encourage companies to demonstrate strengths in these areas. This is in line with the government’s call for businesses to pay greater attention to inclusive growth whilst pursuing productivity and innovation improvements to underpin the competitiveness of their industries.” he added.

The Federation will also be organising a series of sustainability diagnostic workshops, to enable companies to benchmark their sustainability efforts vis-a-vis other Singapore companies and industry best practice. This knowledge will help businesses improve their environmental impact, and move industries forward as a whole in terms of sustainability.

Continuing its collaboration with the National University of Singapore, SBF has also produced the 3nd edition of the Singapore Sustainability Awards 2012 Winners’ Case Study Handbook. Entitled “Converging Towards a Sustainable Future”, the handbook provides insights on the motivations and experiences of the previous year’s awards winners, and is intended to serve as a source of reference to spur businesses to follow in the footsteps of green pioneers.

The winner of the Top Honour for Sustainable Business Award (SME), ECO Special Waste Management Pte Ltd CEO Mr Rick Reidinger said “The Singapore Sustainability Awards an important recognition of our hard work over the years to reduce our environmental footprint, maximise resource recovery, and in other ways achieve the ultimate goal of sustainability.”

Echoing similar sentiments, winner of the Top Honour for Sustainable Business Award (large enterprises), Keppel Land Ltd’s Director of Corporate Services Mr Choo Chin Teck said that there is a call for higher sustainability standards among companies especially in the areas of environmental, social and governance issues as well as financial transparency.

“We will continue to benchmark ourselves against leading sustainable companies, actively engage various stakeholders in our sustainability journey, building knowledge and promoting the exchange of ideas and industry best practices,” he said.

Sustainable Business Awards (SBA)

Small & Medium Enterprises

 ECO Special Waste Management Pte Ltd*

Large Enterprises

 Keppel Land Limited*

 Gammon Pte. Limited

 Keppel Telecommunications & Transportation Ltd

 Swire Pacific Offshore Operations Pte Ltd

Green Technology Awards (GTA)

Small & Medium Enterprises

 Greenpac (S) Pte Ltd*

 Biomax Technologies Pte Ltd

 Sunseap Leasing Pte Ltd

 Third Wave Power Pte Ltd

Large Enterprises

 Panasonic Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd.*

 Akzo Nobel Paints (Singapore) Pte. Ltd.

 Carrier Singapore (Pte) Ltd

 Eltek Power Pte Ltd

 Ricoh Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd.

Source: www.sbf.org.sg