[FR] Environment Day: focus on our CSR progress and projects

This Monday, 5 June 2023, is World Environment Day, which celebrates the progress made in protecting the planet and biodiversity, and raises everyone’s awareness of these crucial issues. On this occasion, it’s only natural for RAJA to take you on a journey through the CSR advances and projects carried out by the Group and its subsidiaries. Who better to interview for Environment Day at RAJA than its Group CSR and Sustainable Development Director, Brigitte Thieck?

On the programme: the environmental commitments included in RAJA’s CSR approach, some inspiring key figures, as well as examples of the many CSR actions put in place.

Environment Day on 5 June: RAJA’s commitments

On the occasion of Environment Day 2023, the RAJA Group is proud to recall the eco-responsible and ethical commitments it makes on a daily basis.
The environmental priorities of our CSR strategy, drawn up by our new Group CSR Department, are as follows:

Helping to combat global warming and protect the environment:

• By taking action to measure and reduce the CO2 emissions of all our activities: at the level of offices, distribution centres and transport, but also by taking action in terms of employee travel and reducing the environmental impact of digital activities,
• By raising the awareness of our employees through the implementation of an energy-saving plan,
• By reducing our consumption of fossil fuels and installing photovoltaic panels on our sites to produce renewable energy,
• By reducing our consumption of water and fossil fuels, as well as waste production, waste recovery, increasing the lifespan of products, reusing and recycling them.

Continuing to develop ever more innovative and eco-responsible products.

• By working in partnership with our suppliers and in collaboration with our customers to offer innovative and increasingly eco-responsible products,
• By continuing to win numerous national and international awards for our capacity for responsible innovation (products distributed and websites),
• By taking care to reduce the impact of our products and services on the environment, by setting up a responsible logistics organisation and sales media
• By constantly monitoring products and technologies that emit less CO2, in order to reference and distribute them.
• Deploying an eco-responsible purchasing policy, which stipulates that the environment must be respected by the suppliers and service providers who work with us.

Involving our employees and raising their awareness of the need to protect the environment:

• An initiative that also involves customers, suppliers, financial partners and all the associations with which RAJA works.
• Helping our customers to achieve their environmental objectives by responding to their increasing demands in this area.

RAJA’s CSR progress in 2023 in 5 key figures

RAJA’s ecological and social commitment is not just a fine CSR policy, but also concrete advances that are pushing the group’s entire ecosystem towards more ethical and responsible practices.

The proof is in the figures:

• RAJA is the first retailer in France to have signed up to the ECOWATT charter : a French scheme that commits the company to reducing energy consumption by 10%.
• In 2023, RAJA set up a dynamic network of 30 CSR/Environment representatives who are deployed across the support functions and the group’s 26 companies: these are local CSR ambassadors who are responsible for implementing the group’s ambitious CSR policy.
• 98% of RAJA’s suppliers are based in the European Union, enabling all subsidiaries to distribute locally manufactured products.
• 75% of the packaging products sold by RAJA are eco-responsible, whether they are certified with environmental labels, recyclable, made from recycled or biosourced materials.
• The parent company has committed to reducing CO2 emissions linked to the delivery of products to customers by 28%, by taking part in ADEME’s FRET21 programme. To achieve this, RAJA’s delivery fleet is switching from diesel-powered lorries to vehicles that run on biogas, thereby reducing CO2 emissions from deliveries to our customers by 86%. And good news for Environment Day: in 2023, RAJA is already ahead of its annual target.

Brigitte Thieck, Group CSR Director, talks to us about RAJA’s CSR commitments.

Find out more about her career and the CSR programme she deploys and manages in the Group on a daily basis with her network of CSR representatives.

Can you introduce yourself?

I began my career working for ten years in multinationals such as Suez and Veolia, where I learned about environmental protection in all its different aspects: Waste reduction and recovery; energy efficiency; water treatment and recycling; transport optimisation; helping international clients achieve their environmental objectives…

Then, in 2003, I co-founded the pioneering firm EcoEthic, specialising in CSR support for companies of all sizes and in all sectors of activity, which I managed for 17 years. Within this structure, I was able to support hundreds of companies in building their environmental, social and economic commitments, in particular through participative workshops for managers and employees, to enable them to translate CSR into concrete actions in their businesses and activities to position them at the heart of the CSR strategy.

I then worked at Kuehne & Nagel as National Environmental Manager, supporting the company’s 130 French sites on these key issues.

In September 2022, I joined the RAJA Group as Group CSR and Sustainable Development Director.

Why did you get involved in CSR?

When CSR became compulsory for French companies in 2001 with the NRE law, I quickly realised that companies lacked perspective and tools, as well as feedback and concrete elements for integrating CSR and applying it concretely to different activities.

So I decided to contribute to the development of ad hoc tools and methodologies to meet companies’ practical needs in this area. As I’m very curious and like to try and solve problems, I launched my own consultancy firm. So you could say that I’ve been one of the pioneers of CSR for 28 years.

What’s more, CSR has been a topical issue for decades, and one that we absolutely must take on board if we are to improve our quality of life in society. It’s a central issue for the well-being of employees and citizens alike, and one that is fundamentally close to my heart. To work in this field, you have to have real convictions, and be sincere – otherwise you can’t convince anyone!

What is your role at RAJA?

I’m responsible for developing and implementing the CSR strategy and associated policy for the 26 companies, for the Group, in its 26 subsidiaries in 19 countries. I’m responsible for structuring, ensuring consistency, steering and monitoring the results of the CSR policy, in order to improve CSR practices in all the subsidiaries. The ultimate aim is to help RAJA’s customers achieve their own CSR objectives.

How do the Group’s CSR commitments translate into everyday practice for RAJA employees?

RAJA’s environmental commitments are reflected in the day-to-day lives of our employees in a number of ways.

Individual and collective respect for eco-actions in their day-to-day work: linked to the energy-saving plan (lighting, heating, use of electronic equipment), by sorting waste so that it can be recycled, by respecting and treating colleagues fairly, by encouraging low-carbon travel for our employees and also for the delivery of our goods to our customers, by sharing best practice, by supporting the actions of the RAJA-Danièle Marcovici foundation for the emancipation of women throughout the world, and also by responding to the increasing number of requests from customers about what we are doing in this area, that the CSR actions of our employees are visible. Everyone is encouraged to control their consumption in terms of lighting, electronic equipment, officetemperatures, transport, etc. In particular, we encourage videoconferencing meetings, as well as the use of electric and hybrid vehicles for staff company and service vehicles, and the use of biogas lorries to deliver our products.

We have also set up a CSR Team at Group level, made up of CSR representatives from each of our subsidiaries. They implement the Group’s CSR strategy and report on good practice, initiatives and difficulties in this area. We are going to give concrete expression to all this in an Intranet community that will be a breeding ground for proposals and information, to further enrich our CSR policy.

What labels has RAJA been able to obtain to increase its CSR commitment?

First of all, we are continuing to improve our approach on an ongoing basis, by having it assessed by Ecovalis at both group and RAJA subsidiary level. The parent company of RAJA France has been Gold certified since October 2022 and, at Group level, we are now also aiming for Gold certification.

Many of our subsidiaries are also ISO certified:

• 23 out of 26 companies are ISO9001 certified
• 20 are ISO14001 certified
• 6 are 450001 certified
• 2 are 50001 certified

Many of our products carry eco-labels, such as FSC(Forest Stewardship Council) or PEFC, which indicate that the paper or cardboard comes from sustainably managed forests.

But beyond eco-labels, RAJA wants to be a good corporate citizen. The group supports the Global Compact, which aims to respect ten key principles, including a commitment to human rights, environmental protection, international labour standards and anti-corruption measures.

This year, we are the first retailer to become a partner member of the CSR Europe network, but we are also taking action on RAJA’s economic ecosystem. In fact, we are the first European distributor to have joined this network.

What future CSR projects can you tell us about at RAJA?

We have chosen a digital tool that will enable us to become autonomous in calculating the CO2 emissions of each of our subsidiaries. We’re going to launch a training programme for our teams, so that they can become knowledgeable and autonomous in calculating and reducing CO2 emissions wherever we operate. In very concrete terms, this calculation will help us to make an even greater commitment to drastically reducing the CO2 emissions linked to our activities, with a view to eventually obtaining SBTi certification, which obliges companies to ensure that global warming does not exceed 2 degrees.

Furthermore, in terms of IT, we want to decarbonise digital activities. We are therefore increasingly committed to green IT solutions, choosing IT hardware made from recycled materials, as well as software packages that reduce the consumption of IT hardware, and we are optimising the temperature of IT server rooms to reduce the energy consumed in cooling them.

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Thank you to Brigitte for sharing these eco-responsible advances and ambitions with us on World Environment Day, organised by the United Nations!

To find out more about how RAJA has been working to reduce its impact on the environment for 65 years, visit our “RAJA and the environment” page.