Sometime ago, “Takasago America's Chief EHS Officer” stated “only people can protect the environment”. With this in mind, Takasago U.S.A. has continuously sought to leverage our personnel resources in various manners to improve our environmental sustainability efforts. Thanks to our personnel in our production facilities, we experienced greater than 2% reduction for energy usage, water consumption and waste generation at our production facilities. During this same time period, waste material being recycled has increased much more than 2%. In fact, various Takasago U.S.A. employees (led by Takasago U.S.A.’s Mgr. Corporate Safety, Health and Environmental) collaborated to take one of our largest waste streams at our fragrance production facility and create a saleable product, resulting in 100% reduction of this waste stream.

Takasago U.S.A. initiated a “Corporate Energy Conservation and Waste Minimization” committee to assist with our existing Environmental Management System goals and to seek new opportunities for improving our sustainability efforts. It is important to corporate management; employee representation from all facilities is maintained on this committee. To date, this committee has focused on assessment of energy usage via current practices and increasing volumes of materials recycled at our facilities.

Efforts by our employees for the second consecutive year, made it possible for us to be recognized as an Environmental Steward by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. This distinction is awarded to organizations who demonstrate voluntary and proactive measures to go beyond environmental regulatory compliance in an effort to ensure a sustainable future we can be most proud of. For Takasago U.S.A., these efforts led to our flavor facility no longer being considered a “Significant Industrial User” of water resources. This has motivated us to seek this status at other facilities.

Our employees support Takasago’s community involvement initiatives. One of these community involvement initiatives is the “Verizon Wireless Corporate Classic 5K Run” which benefits a charity known as the “JERSEY BATTERED WOMEN'S SERVICE, INC.”. Takasago U.S.A.’s involvement further enables Verizon Wireless to recycle and refurbish cell phones in a manner that preserves the environment and create financial benefit for victims of domestic violence and their families.