In the aftermath of the events caused by the health crisis which has affected us worldwide in the most unthinkable way, the year 2019 seems like miles away, above all from the point of view of companies and, more precisely, companies in the industrial sector.
In this scenario, where the medium and long-term future is far from certain, the publication of our corporate report reminds us of the fact that the work and efforts we made in the previous periods will be a crucial factor to reduce the impact of this crisis. This is when the value of the seeds sown will be put to the test.
In 2019, Sidenor further invested in the modernisation of its facilities, for a total amount of 84 million euros, in order to complete the second rolling mill modernisation phase. This investment follows the investments performed in 2017 which, in total, amount to over 100 million euros.
As set out in the letter from our Chairman José A. Jainaga, the aim was no other than to fulfil the pledge made by the new management of Sidenor when it started leading the company at the end of 2016: to put Sidenor at the forefront of the iron and steel industry by committing to technological development, process automation, product traceability and the implementation of Industry 4.0 criteria.
At Sidenor, we are building, in cooperation with all agents in our value chain, a path towards achieving business excellence in order to further grow in a sustainable way and ensure the Group’s future.
Accordingly, we have reduced CO2 emissions by 16% and improved energy efficiency by 5% in electricity and by 8% in natural gas since 2012; besides, Sidenor annually recycles a total amount of 950,000 tonnes of scrap and valorises 82% of the generated waste.
All this, however, would not be posible without our human team and, for this reason, we further commit to providing installations that are increasingly safer, to fostering behaviours based on our Code of Ethics, which is reviewed every year, to promoting gender balance and to further implementing the measures of our Equality Plan, investing in the training and development of the people of Sidenor, whereby we provided a total of 68,941 training hours over 2019.
Besides, last year, Sidenor joined the SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) initiative, 3 of which were identified as priority goals: SDG5 (Gender Equality), SDG9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure) and SDG12 (Responsible Consumption and Production).
What we want to say with this is that we are proud, each year, to share this Report which reflects the most relevant activities of each financial year, but it would not be fair to interpret actions that are compartmentalised in 12 months, as all actions we introduce are just new steps on a way towards the future, which we started when we took the first step as Sidenor Aceros Especiales; now, more than ever, we are aware of the potential obstacles we might encounter, as is the case along all paths, but we are well prepared to face the next step, even if it seems that the map we had some months ago will not be useful in the close future, and that we will have to make the path by walking. Luckily, our material as well as our team are well prepared and we will continue to strive to further build our path towards the future.