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It was among the first yarn companies to draw up the sustainability report, and now that it has reached its sixth edition, the Biella-based Zegna Baruffa Lane Borgosesia – leader in knitting yarns in the premium segment, 110 million turnover in 2022 with 2.2 million profit and 634 direct employees – sets new goals, having already improved, year after year, energy efficiency, reduced the use of water and the production of waste, reduced CO2 emissions and increased attention to the local area, .
«We are inviting our strategic suppliers of raw materials, dyes and components to join a platform that will allow them to manage traceability information and give them a score – explains the managing director Lorenzo Piacentini – and this will also mean increasing the percentage of yarns made with traceable wool: today we are one third of the total, we will increase this percentage already during this year».
Measuring sustainability as a competitive advantage
Sustainability has now become a development strategy for the company chaired by Alfredo Botto Poala, who will present the new collections for autumn-winter 2024-2025 at Pitti Filati in Florence (June 28-30): «Sustainability costs – says the CEO – but we see it as an investment to live up to what the world, especially the luxury world, is asking of us. Auditing is becoming more and more professional, and we hope that measuring sustainability will also become a competitive advantage in the future. We believe in it, and we are also analyzing the governance processes in order to be able to improve them».
The 2022 budget
The 2022 sustainability report of Zegna Baruffa Lane Borgosesia reports progress on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (the total of Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions decreased by 5% compared to 2021, against an increase in the production of yarns by 6%); a 4% decrease in water withdrawals compared to the previous year; an 11% drop in waste generation. The three production plants (Vigliano, Lessona, Borgosesia) were powered by renewable energy, which now accounts for 39% of total energy consumption.
Sustainability manager and development directors
Last January, the figure of the Sustainability manager was added to the Sustainability Committee, established in the company since 2019, who deals with the development of processes, operational follow-up and reporting of the corporate sustainability strategy. «These great moments of change and acceleration in our sustainability strategy – Alfredo Botto Poala wrote in the letter to the stakeholders accompanying the sustainability report – are harmoniously integrated into our global approach, which has been consistently developing for years along five key directions : responsible business management; quality and innovation; a sustainable supply flow; an operations structure to protect the environment; the respect and appreciation of the people of Zegna Baruffa Lane Borgosesia».