The aim of the workshop was to help our suppliers with their own Sustainability Strategies, by sharing best practice, solutions and successes, and collectively planning actions.
The day kicked off with an influential fireside chat with Clive Higgins, UK Chair and CEO, who highlighted the importance of Leonardo taking a leading role in sustainability. This was followed by an open Q&A where audience members had the opportunity to ask questions.
UK Head of Sustainability, Ben Knight, then set the context for the day by giving an overview of why sustainability is important to business, the economy and communities – and how sustainability is a key driver for Leonardo’s Industrial Plan. Ben was followed by Julian Russell, VP Finance Sustainability & Transformation, who took attendees through the importance and considerations of ESG regulations and reporting, detailed future considerations, and offered support to SME Suppliers with ESG Reporting.
He was followed by Leonardo’s UK Sustainability Team which presented an overview of sustainability at Leonardo, providing updates on some key projects. Sarah Gobind-Cook and Loris Buffon, Sustainability Leads for Leonardo’s Electronics and Helicopters businesses, highlighted the importance of Integrating and Embedding Sustainability – specifically highlighting the establishment of Sustainability IPTs across the divisions – whilst delving deeper into local site projects. These include a major refurbishment project incorporating new zero-emissions technology in Edinburgh, Product Carbon Footprints in the company’s Engineering function, the 45-acre solar farm being built in Yeovil by Conrad Energy to power Leonardo’s site , and an innovative Rotor Blade recycling project with cleantech company Uplift360.
The focus of the workshop subsequently moved to the specifics of the supply chain. Leonardo’s UK business has recently become a member of JOSCAR ZERO and Becca Poole and Emily Toyne from Hellios presented an overview of JOSCAR ESG and Zero to attendees, explaining how it can support reducing emissions across the supply chain.
During a Supplier Spotlight session, Morsons, which has a long-standing strategic partnership with Leonardo in the UK supporting various engineering and resourcing needs, shared an overview of their sustainability activities and good practice, and highlighted, recent successes since last attending the workshop in December.
Later in the day, Small99 – founders of People Planet Pint – ran an interactive workshop on risks and opportunities of sustainability to instigate actionable outcomes for suppliers to takeaway.
Attendees worked together to identify risks, challenges, opportunities, best practice and successes – and then worked collectively to pledge actions to take back to their businesses. This included pledges to look at digital sustainability, business travel and commuting – and companies were introduced to other businesses in the room to help tackle these specific challenges, including Route Zero, Mobilityways and Enterprise.
The day concluded with a panel session on the topic of Global Risk and how our suppliers are helping Leonardo reduce this risk and find value creation opportunities. The session saw representatives from Couch to Carbon Zero, ISEP, and Rebalance Earth present solutions to help our reduce and mitigate environmental, financial and societal risk from Climate Change, explore how nature can provide key ecosystem services, and the roles of engagement and skills in delivering sustainability.
Our thanks to everyone who attended, including all our invited guests for helping make the day such a success.
