In an interview with Bloomberg, IKEA’s CEO Jesper Brodin speaks on ‘Leaders with Lacqua’ about how his career progressed and his love of design.
With a career spanning over 20 years, Jesper Brodin started out at IKEA as a Purchasing Manager in Pakistan, and also reveals that he was the only applicant for the job. According to Jesper Brodin, the political turbulence in Karachi made it difficult for foreigners to seek employment opportunities in Pakistan; hence he was the sole applicant.
Upon being questioned about sustainability, Jesper Brodin stated that he realized while working in Pakistan, the company had a greater ethical responsibility beyond the stores’ four walls and came to the conclusion that the company needs to take responsibility for all the outcomes of its productions, including the well-being of its employees.
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It still took the company 10 years to implement policies that would ensure the safety of the environment and its employees. Jesper Brodin further states that it was not an easy decision for the company as such an initiative was costly. However, he believes that sustainability is actually cost-effective.
The time to act is now. We are proud to lead the way together with other industry friends and partners towards more sustainable materials. Read more: https://t.co/MhsTXYRc1V pic.twitter.com/B80Rz53KCE
— IKEA (@IKEA) May 27, 2021
“People assume (sustainability) should come at a premium, when it’s actually the opposite,” said Jesper Brodin, IKEA Group CEO.
As per Jesper Brodin, going green benefitted IKEA as the company reduced its prices and improved its quality, making it the popular choice for home furnishings.
He also asserted that IKEA would never hire a climate change denier.
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Going climate positive
In 2020, IKEA became the world’s 4th most valuable retailer, valued at $48 billion. IKEA has 445 stores all over the world and employees a workforce of more than 210,000 people. Annually, it publishes 200 million copies of its catalog, making it the world’s most distributed book.
Despite such a huge global reach, by 2030, IKEA aims to become completely climate positive by reducing more greenhouse gas emissions than the IKEA value chain emits, while still growing the IKEA business.
We aim to become climate positive by 2030, to achieve this we now support our 1,600 suppliers to consume 100% renewable electricity. Read more about our climate initiative here: https://t.co/b6NnkDTTOk pic.twitter.com/nwH9i0QwyD
— IKEA (@IKEA) June 10, 2021
Currently, IKEA generates 0.1 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. The world’s largest furniture retailer also revealed in its latest sustainability report that its global carbon footprint across all scopes decreased 4.3% in absolute terms during the 2019 fiscal year.
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