kinnarps-sustainability-report-2023

24

strategy

challenge

Long and complex

supply chains

The extraction of raw materials and the manufacturing

of materials are part of a complex global context.

For us as an individual operator, it’s a huge challenge

to trace the origin of raw materials such as oil, plastic,

ore and metal, and monitor the conditions under

which they were produced. It’s much easier for us to

influence our direct suppliers. Longer supply chains

are more complicated to map, as we don’t have the

financial relationship with the suppliers, which also

means that we have less ability to influence them.

For the same reason, it’s challenging for us to

influence the efficiency of material use in the

supplier chain.

 Wood is unique in that there are good traceability

certifications and this is why we have set particularly

high targets in this area. But the availability of certified

wood is limited at the best of times and has declined

even further as a result of the war in Ukraine. Nor is it

enough for the wood to have traceability certification

– it also needs to meet our high quality requirements.

material requirements We stipulate that all

our suppliers sign up to accept and comply with

the requirements specified in our Code of Conduct

in relation to social conditions and environmental

considerations during production, and that they

forward these requirements up the supply chain.

We insist that all articles we procure must meet

material requirements based on the criteria in the

relevant ecolabels. We also obtain information about

the country of manufacture and have procedures

for monitoring the origin of all wood raw material.

We do not accept wood from forests with high

conservation values, areas which have been converted

from natural forest into plantations, or forests

where there are ongoing social conflicts. Our units

in Kinnarp, Skillingaryd, Tranås and Vinslöv all have

FSC® Chain of Custody traceability certification.

FSC® labelling is a guarantee that the raw material

comes from environmentally adapted, socially

responsible and financially viable forestry.

resource efficiency We’re constantly working

to streamline our production processes and material

utilisation in order to reduce waste. We’ve made

major investments in the Skillingaryd factory, in order

to increase the utilisation rate of textiles with more

precise cutting. Of the waste that still arises, we sort

out polyester fabrics that, together with recycled PET

bottles, are used for the sound-absorbing material

Re:fill in new products. We’ve been participating in the

TexChain3 project in order to develop methods for

using textile waste in more products. One result from

the project is a finished sample of a padding material

consisting of shredded and pressed textile waste from

our own production in Tranås. We’re now working on

implementing the material in some of our products. In

addition to this, we’ve invested in an efficient level laser

for our factory in Jönköping, which reduces sheet

metal waste by 15 percentage points.

Material requirements

and resource efficiency