What Does Sustainability Mean to You: Essay

Nowadays, sustainability is becoming more and more attention all around the world. To save the planet and achieve a sustainable future, governments, organizations, civil societies, and private sectors need to work together and make new regulations and actions. People usually hear the word ‘sustainability’, but I can say that many of them do not know what it means. I got closer to it at my workplace when the sustainable strategy was announced in the last year. This is one of the reasons, why I have chosen this topic. The other reason is, that I would like to get more information about sustainability, sustainable development, and its goals.

The purpose of my writing is to explain the definitions, such as sustainability, sustainable development, Sustainable Development Goals, and sustainable manufacturing. This paper presents a variety of initiatives, which are very important to achieve sustainable manufacturing. In the last section, I would like to share some points of the sustainable strategy of my workplace.

The simplest interpretation of sustainability is improving and sustaining a healthy economic, ecological, and social system for human development. To achieve a sustainable future, governments and societies need to follow the guidelines of sustainable development. The Sustainable Development (SD) concept was announced first in Stockholm, in 1972. There was a world summit, which was held by the United Nations (UN). In this meeting, the member countries of the UN agreed to develop stronger environmental policies while developing the economy. The first definition of SD was in the Brundtland report in 1987. It was defined, as “sustainable development a development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. This report has a lot of focus points like the global situation of the population, food, energy, etc. The goals and the action plans for the implementation of SD were established in 1992. A global partnership was developed to solve global environmental problems, therefore the sustainable development strategy moved into global action. SD has three dimensions, which are economy, society, and environment. These dimensions of sustainability are also called as Triple Bottom Line, which describes the relationship between environmental, economic, and social aspects of SD. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were identified in 2000. MDGs had 8 key areas and 21 targets until 2015 to develop and eliminate extreme poverty. The main aims of SD are economic growth, environmental protection, and social equality. Based on this, SD has the following pillars:

• Economic sustainability means the system of production that satisfies present consumption levels without compromising future needs. The main activities of the economy are production, distribution, and consumption. Decisions should be made in the most equitable and fiscally sound way while considering the aspects of sustainability.
• Social sustainability includes equity, empowerment, accessibility participation, and cultural identity. It aims to provide and enable conditions for everyone to realize their needs.
• Environmental sustainability is about the environment, nature, and how it remains productive and resilient to support human life. The Earth, where we live, has limits. Therefore, people need to be careful and pay attention to harvesting natural resources, it must be done no faster than they can be regenerated, while waste must be emitted no faster than it can be assimilated by the environment.

“Transforming our World – the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” was approved in New York, in September 2015. This agenda contains the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which have 17 goals with 169 special targets relating to social, ecological, and economic developments. All member states of the UN have committed to achieving these goals by 2030. Therefore, sustainability has moved up in the business agenda. SDGs replaced the MDGs and involve six elements: dignity, human beings, planet, prosperity, justice, and partnership. The Sustainable Development Goals are comprised to guide the SD for all regions, including the developed and the developing countries. The key purpose of the goals is achieving poverty alleviation and promoting economic development, implementing the concept of SD, ensuring social inclusion, and protecting the environment. To achieve these goals a global partnership is needed among governments, private sectors, researchers, and civil society organizations. They need to make the right decisions to improve life in a sustainable way for future generations. The objectives and targets of SDGs are interdependent but interlinked, which means one goal could help to address some others at the same time.

Sustainable Development Goals:

• Goal 1: No Poverty
• Goal 2: Zero Hunger
• Goal 3: Good Health and Well-being
• Goal 4: Quality, Education
• Goal 5: Gender Equality
• Goal 6: Clean water and sanitation
• Goal 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
• Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
• Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
• Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities
• Goal 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
• Goal 12: Responsible Consumption and Production
• Goal 13: Climate Action
• Goal 14: Life Below Water
• Goal 15: Life on Land
• Goal 16: Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions
• Goal 17: Partnerships for the goals

After getting closer to the above definitions, we can see that sustainable development is a major driver in our everyday lives. Sustainability has become more and more relevant for production companies in recent years as well. Companies need to integrate sustainable development into their strategies and develop strategic management to the managing of achieving their sustainable goals.

Sustainable manufacturing (SM) means during the production process must demonstrate reduced environmental impact, offer improved energy and resource efficiency, generate the minimum quantity of waste, provide operational safety, and offer improved personnel health, while maintaining or improving the product and process quality with overall lifecycle cost benefits. Sustainable manufacturing is different than lean and green manufacturing because it works with 6R, instead of 1R or 3R. The following 6Rs need to be considered in the implementation of SM: reduce, reuse, recycle, recover, redesign, and remanufacture. Some companies have already taken steps to implement sustainability and develop a better future.

In 2016, a study was published about the business imperatives and strategic capabilities, which are necessary to enable value creation through sustainable manufacturing. This study presents the major challenges of manufacturing organizations as they attempt to implement sustainable manufacturing practices. The values of manufacturing are generated through activities and interactions between suppliers, manufacturers, customers, and other stakeholders. To achieve sustainable manufacturing, a variety of challenges must be overcome to develop innovative strategies for sustainable value creation. According to the study, the following key strategic capabilities were identified by experts to enable fast and broader implementation of sustainable manufacturing practices. These will be listed below.

- Sustainable manufacturing education and workforce development:

Achieving a sustainable manufacturing, educated and sustainability-aware workforce is necessary, they can increase corporate knowledge and support innovation, which is a key requirement for sustainability. Therefore, the most important focus points of education and workforce development are the 3Rs of the education lifecycle (recruit, re-educate, retrain) of personnel to be suitable with the knowledge and skills requirement.

- Next-generation decision support toolset:

The Lifecycle Assessment delivers value only regarding environmental and energy impact and it is not integrated with product and process development or not providing support in decision-making. It is a good possibility to integrate these into one system, which can support the decision-making for the whole lifecycle sustainable assessment in the product development system. This integrated decision support toolset could be used for total lifecycle sustainability assessment. That means, using this toolset helps to integrate innovations in products, and processes, provides access data from the stages of the lifecycle, and can measure and evaluate the total lifecycle sustainability effects and help in decision making.

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- Risk uncertainty and unintended consequences for supply networks

A supply chain incident per year is usually experienced by the companies, which has immediate effects on productivity, revenue, and company reputation. These unexpected failures present a demand for improved risk assessment. It is very important to establish safe operating systems, safe assurance, energy efficiency, environmental responsibility, and sustainable operation. Current risk models do not handle all factors are often too simple, and present less approach to risks based on past events. Risk models with real-time visibility and intelligence for risk identification, assessment, avoidance, and mitigation are necessary. By implementing risk assessment and mitigation measurement, companies can meet customer requirements and achieve a profitable and sustainable future.

- Product Lifecycle Management capability for process planning

Existing process planning practices are limited in emphasis to the manufacturing stage of the product lifecycle. Involving and establishing Product Lifecycle Management can guarantee more value generation by assessing the impact of product design on impacts in other lifecycle stages. There is a need to move from process planning to optimizing processes, which are integrated with product design functions, and to facilitate ease of end-of-life processing. Reusing, remanufacturing, and recycling are included. This will allow optimized planning for 6R processes and have a sustainable focus on all processes. The PLM capability for process planning will reduce the need for iterative process development and will contribute to increased sustainable value creation.

- Lifecycle cost models

Cost cutting and product optimization could be achieved by using better lifecycle cost models, which can deliver better products at lower costs. These models include data and information from the following product lifecycle stages: pre-manufacturing, manufacturing, use, and post-use, and will permit more accurate cost assessment in the development process to reduce product cost. The model enables to development of product design that allows for better end-of-life management to promote increased value recovery. Total lifecycle cost models will also provide business value by reducing the risk of unanticipated cost escalation.

- 6R-focused end-of-life management

Improved end-of-life planning offers the opportunity to reduce environmental impact, save energy, and maximize the total lifecycle value of the product. The 6R concept offers a great foundation for instilling end-of-life planning in the development process. When all combinations of 6Rs are engaged and optimized, lifecycle management plans will result. End-of-life management focuses on higher-value recovery options e.g., reuse or remanufacturing before recycling.

- Flexible and scalable manufacturing alternatives

The next level of evolution for manufacturing must be flexible and scalable systems that produce products at the most beneficial location, utilizing the best available resources, methods, and equipment to provide dramatic cost reduction, increased productivity, and sustainability advantages, this can lead to achieving sustainability performance. Implementing flexible and scalable manufacturing practices will allow companies to reduce risk and meet quality.

- Sustainable manufacturing metrics

There is no method for measuring the triple bottom-line achievements. These methods would provide a measure of sustainability across countries, cultures, and manufacturing companies. Standard metrics would also support the determination of rewards and incentives that would lead to achieving optimized lifecycle performance and improved product and process sustainability. Better sustainable manufacturing metrics and measurement frameworks will enable a more definitive assessment of the impact of sustainability initiatives on competitive position and identification of areas of focus. Metrics can also help evaluate the long-term and short-term benefits of sustainability initiatives to help make decisions that will be of strategic importance to create business and sustainable value.

- Other strategies

In addition to the above-written strategies, there are a lot of others as well. Real-time information-driven decision-making will help companies make better decisions and reduce costs, it also provides insight to protect the company from unintended consequences and mitigate risks. Better visibility and information availability will help eliminate wasteful and inefficient operations, promote sustainability, and increase profits to increase overall business value. This is another strategic need to enable increased value creation through sustainable manufacturing. Cyber attacks cause harm globally every day, and the risk of supply networks suffering catastrophic damage is significant. While protection from an attack is imperative, it is equally important that the supply network be able to confidently exchange needed information without fear and within acceptable risk boundaries. Providing an open, shared, and secure environment is the motivation for this imperative. Secure collaboration platforms are needed and will enable the confident sharing of needed information across the supply network, avoiding such costs.

My workplace is a production company, and its sustainable strategy was announced by the management team in the last year. So, the entire group supports achieving the SDGs. The main reason is to create products, which are useful for society, to treat the customers, suppliers, shareholders, and employees, and to maintain financial independence. 3 SDGs are highlighted from the 17: good health and well-being (SDG 3), sustainable cities and communities (SDG 11), and partnership for the goals (SDG 17). It pioneers climate and nature tasks, innovative sustainable products, and secures a responsible business. Next, I would like to share some actions, which are important to achieve by 2030.

As a production company, the reduction of carbon emissions is important. Therefore, one of the main goals is to become a carbon-neutral company. The company collaborates with an international organization, that cares about nature, to protect the economy and achieve a sustainable future. They would like to involve the suppliers as well to reduce the carbon footprint. The company makes an effort to green the packaging materials (eg. replacement of foil packaging with paper packaging). The employee’s health and well-being are also very important to my workplace, so the management team wants to continue it and create equal opportunities for everyone. Year by year the number of accidents is decreasing and they would like to achieve zero across the entire business by 2030. Furthermore, the following are also very important: reduction of waste, making new sustainable innovations, comfortable workspace for the workers, reducing the air business travels, using green company cars, and promoting circular economy (reduce-reuse-recycle).