Sabancı Holding Focuses on 'Net Zero' Targets

Sabancı Holding Focuses on Net Zero Targets Following the recommendations of the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), one of the world's most respected global standards, Sabancı Holding will reduce Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 42 percent by 2030 and will continue to lead the fight against climate emergency. To this end, the Sabancı Group will implement various initiatives including renewable energy use, alternative fuels, raw material substitution, reduction of electricity losses and leakage, and green hydrogen use, while also strengthening its sustainability approach through 'new economy' investments. Sabancı Holding Chief Executive Officer Cenk Alper stated that in coordination with the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), the group will take an important step towards its Net Zero targets by reducing direct carbon emissions by at least 42 percent by 2030. According to Sabancı Holding's statement, the Sabancı Group, which mobilized all its resources in the earthquakes that occurred on 6 February and directly affected nearly 7,000 of its employees, continues to support the healing of wounds in the region together with all its companies and volunteers. Alongside all the human and community-focused work it has carried out, the group continues to take pioneering steps to address climate emergency within its sustainability roadmap, and has made another important commitment that will serve as an example to Turkish business. The group previously made a commitment to reach Net Zero levels in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, setting a precedent in Turkey, and demonstrated its firm stance on sustainability, which is at the center of its 'Group Promise', through the interim targets it announced.

Improved ESG rating by three notches in the last three years

Sabancı Holding CEO Alper, whose views are included in the statement, said that they have placed sustainability at the foundation of their growth strategy, and that while strengthening their vision of 'Turkey's Sabancı' through international investments to become 'The World's Sabancı', they see sustainability as the guiding star for them. Noting that they first announced their 2050 Net Zero targets at the beginning of 2021, thus making a long-term commitment and setting a precedent among Turkish holdings on this matter, Alper stated: 'We continued to support our firm stance on this matter with our achievements in 2022. In the MSCI ESG Rating, one of the world's leading ESG rating agencies, we achieved a three-notch rating increase over the last three years and reached an A rating in 2022. As Sabancı Holding, we were included in the BIST 25 Sustainability Index in 2022, which lists companies traded on BIST with the highest corporate sustainability performance. Additionally, among the 9 companies from Turkey on the CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project) Global A List, which is recognized as one of the world's most important indices in this field, 3 are from the Sabancı Group.' Alper expressed his belief that the stance Sabancı has taken on sustainability is very important for the country. Emphasizing that they therefore want to demonstrate their commitment once again by setting interim targets, Alper made the following assessment: 'In coordination with the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), we will take an important step towards our Net Zero target by reducing our direct carbon emissions by at least 42 percent by 2030. We also aim to achieve a 15 percent reduction by the end of 2025 at the latest. This target covers not only the holding but also the direct carbon emissions of all our group companies. In line with these targets, while taking important steps towards digitalization and efficiency in our business lines on the one hand, we will continue to focus on the 'new economy', which is at the center of our global growth strategy, on the other hand.' [caption id="attachment_152532" align="aligncenter"] Cenk Alper[/caption]

Continued new economy investments in the first quarter of 2023

Cenk Alper stated that group companies, through the steps they took in 2023, continue to embrace the holding's 'new economy' approach. Alper said: 'In our energy business line, we continue our renewable energy investments both in our country and in the United States, while continuing our pioneering work to position Turkey as Europe's largest green hydrogen supplier. Our companies in the industrial and construction materials business lines successfully continued to integrate the most innovative practices in the fields of sustainability and advanced materials technologies into their business processes. On the other hand, during this period, we implemented an important organizational change that will support our focus on business models based on new generation technologies, and established our Digital Group Directorate within the holding.' he said. While growing their main business lines on the one hand, Alper said they want to lead the emergence of new unicorns from Turkey on the other hand, and continued: 'In this context, we graduated the first cohort of our Sabancı ARF Almost Ready to Fly program, which we launched last year. Among the 14 start-ups participating in the program, we decided to make seed investments in 8 start-ups, and in the first period of the program, the total in-kind and cash support we provided to all start-ups amounted to TRY 60 million. With this program, while supporting the commercialization of early-stage start-ups, we continue to participate in the growth journeys of high-potential companies through our Corporate Venture Capital Fund, Sabancı Ventures. In this context, most recently we made an investment of USD 800,000 in SunGreenH2, a hydrogen equipment manufacturer. With this investment, the number of start-ups in Sabancı Ventures' portfolio, which was established at the end of 2020, has increased to 8.' According to the information provided, following its financial excellence approach and maintaining a healthy balance sheet structure despite national and international developments, the Sabancı Group also announced its financial results for the first three months of 2023. In light of all these developments, Sabancı Holding increased its combined sales in the first three-month period of 2023 by 81 percent to TRY 131,435 million, while the holding's consolidated net profit for the same period was TRY 6,087 million. Source