Andreas Niedermaier0:13
We use limestone and electricity for our base chemicals as raw material supply for specialties. And the specialties are what we want to continue developing, and there we are very innovative. We try, and if necessary allow failure, but we also try to drive innovation so far that we implement it positively. That is what makes the AlzChem Group: we are innovative, we are fast, and we can act very quickly.
Sustainability is our guiding principle. Over the last 20 years, we have managed to develop our products to the point where we hardly have to landfill anything anymore. In the past we had to operate large landfills, today we have almost no landfilled waste. That means sustainability for us is also a topic of economic efficiency and ecology. If you look further, we have developed a climate roadmap and assume that in 2030 we will actually emit 75% less CO2, and by 2033 possibly even approach zero CO2 emissions. That is innovation. Then there is the social aspect: when I conduct job interviews, employees very much want to know what they are working for, and sustainability plays a big role. If you can show what you are doing in sustainability, you also win employees, and that is a very important topic for us. We are also one of the few companies, or perhaps even the first company in Germany, to pass a so-called say-on-climate resolution at the Annual General Meeting, meaning we also involve our shareholders in the topic of sustainability and want to bring them on board.
We have essentially always dealt with sustainability. In chemistry, sustainability is an integral part, otherwise we could not develop our companies forward. A hundred years ago, sustainability was by no means given this value, but today it is an integral part of our actions. Our goals are, on the one hand, to gain financial freedom by charging fair prices and making fair profits. We want to further strengthen the foundation of the company by continuing to develop specialties. Many years ago, we introduced a core team, structured like a project but essentially without end, and it is interdisciplinary. That is how we want to tackle new topics, including sustainability.
We in Germany, in Bavaria, in Europe, are in system competition with the USA, or more broadly, with the Americas, China, and Japan. We have now become disconnected in terms of energy prices, but as an international company we need competitive energy prices. Only with competitiveness can we continue to pursue innovation and develop. Today we go into the race with far too many prohibitions, not with a culture of permission. We need to succeed again in granting more permissions and developing more speed in this direction. Then we must move away from pure risk assessment towards an opportunity assessment. If something seems risky today, we prefer to forbid it rather than think about opportunities or even conduct an opportunity assessment or even a hazard assessment. With hazard assessment we could then enable a lot and realize opportunities, and that would be important for us. For example, erecting a wind turbine should not be a big issue, but we employ thousands of people with expert reports and topics that already exist a thousandfold. Then the skilled workers are essentially no longer available to build the wind turbines. Therefore, I simply assert that in many areas we have enough people; we just need to deploy them on the right topics or bring them to the right topics, and also think in terms of opportunity. Then we definitely do not have too few skilled workers.
We need support through economic framework conditions where we can operate well. We also need sound tax policy, proper framework conditions, reliable conditions. We cannot completely change the laws every six months. We must also succeed in bringing people along on this path. That is a topic that, in my opinion, is far too neglected today. To be able to implement research and innovation in Europe, in Germany, and in Bavaria, we need to get involved again. We cling to old, familiar things, and old familiar things are being abolished, while new things are far too often added too little. Therefore, I would expect more support from both politics and the population to become bolder in the future, to tackle new things again and make new things possible.
