Sustainable Portfolio Management
A significant steering tool for the product portfolio, based on the sustainability performance of our products, is the Sustainable Solution Steering method. This rates our products’ applications in the relevant markets and customer industries. If, during reassessment of our portfolio, we identify products with significant sustainability concerns, we classify these as “challenged.” We develop and systematically implement action plans for all products in this category. These include research projects and reformulations to optimize products, or even replacing the product with an alternative. To rigorously align our portfolio with contributions to sustainability, in 2018 we started phasing out all Challenged products within five years of their initial classification as “challenged” at the latest. A particular focus in the continued development of our product portfolio is on products that make a substantial sustainability contribution in the value chain. These include products that make positive contributions to areas such as health and safety, reducing emissions and the circular economy.
Our target of generating €22 billion in Accelerator sales by 2025, which was based on our corporate strategy, was already achieved in 2021 with sales of €24.1 billion. In order to address the growing sustainability requirements in our markets with innovative solutions, we want to align our product portfolio even more strongly with climate protection, climate neutrality and the circular economy going forward. That is why we are updating our methodology and our product portfolio steering target and will introduce a revised method in 2023.
