Sustainability

Our Targets

We carry out our corporate purpose, “We create chemistry for a sustainable future,” by pursuing ambitious goals along our entire value chain. In this way, we aim to achieve profitable growth and take on social and environmental responsibility. This also helps to achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).1 We are focusing on issues where we as a company can make a significant contribution, such as sustainable consumption and production, climate action or fighting hunger.

Status of Target Achievement in 2020

Profitable growth

Achieve a return on capital employed (ROCE) considerably above the cost of capital percentage every year
Target
 
>9%
2020 status
1.7%
8-decent work and economic growth and 9-industry, innovation and Infrastructure
SDG 1
Grow sales volumes faster than global chemical production every year
Target
 
>–0.4%
2020 status
–0.5%
8-decent work and economic growth and 9-industry, innovation and Infrastructure
SDG
Increase EBITDA before special items by 3%–5% per year
Target
 
3%–5%
2020 status
–10.7%
8-decent work and economic growth and 9-industry, innovation and Infrastructure
SDG
Increase the dividend per share every year based on a strong free cash flow
Target
 
>€3.30
2020 status
€3.302
8-decent work and economic growth and 9-industry, innovation and Infrastructure
SDG

Effective climate protection

We want to reduce our absolute CO2 emissions3 by 25 percent by 2030.
(Development of carbon emissions compared with baseline 2018)
Target

 

≤16.4 MMT

2020 status
20.8 MMT
green background image with with text 13-climate action
SDG
We aim to achieve net zero CO2 emissions3 by 2050.

Sustainable product portfolio

Achieve €22 billion in Accelerator sales by 2025
Target
 
€22.0 billion
2020 status
€16.7 billion
icons 2-zero hunger, 6-clean water and sanitation, 12- responsible consumption and production, 13-climate action
SDG

Responsible procurement

Cover 90% of our relevant spend with sustainability evaluations by 2025
Target
 
90%
2020 status
80%
8-decent work and 12-responsible consumption and production
SDG
Have 80% of our suppliers improve their sustainability performance upon re-evaluation
Target
 
80%
2020 status
68%
8-decent work and 12-responsible consumption and production
SDG

Resource efficiency and safe production

Reduce worldwide process safety incidents per 200,000 working hours to ≤0.1 by 2025
Target

 

≤0.1 

2020 status
0.3
6-clean water and sanitation, 8-decent work and economic growth
SDG
Reduce the worldwide lost-time injury rate per 200,000 working hours to ≤0.1 by 2025
Target

 

≤0.1

2020 status
0.3
8-decent work and economic growth
SDG
Introduce sustainable water management at our production sites in water stress areas and at our Verbund sites by 2030
Target

 

100%

2020 status
46.2%
6-clean water and sanitation, 12-responsible consumption and production
SDG

Employee engagement and diversity

Increase the proportion of women in leadership positions with disciplinary responsibility to 30% by 2030
Target
 
30%
2020 status
24.3%
5-gender equality
SDG
More than 80% of our employees feel that at BASF, they can thrive and perform at their best
Target
 
>80%
2020 status
82%
8-decent work and economic growth
SDG
Most important key performance indicators

1 More information on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and sustainabledevelopment.un.org

2 Dividend proposed by the Board of Executive Directors

3 The goal includes Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions. Other greenhouse gases are converted into CO2 equivalents according to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol.

We act in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals