Going green - compliance is the main driver

Survey reports that manufacturing companies expect carbon-cutting to increase costs, so it is the need to comply that is the main driver for any change to 'going green'.

A survey of UK enterprise businesses undertaken by Vanson Bourne on behalf of Genesys Conferencing reported that manufacturers are driven by compliance rather than cost pressures.

Consequently, manufacturing is lagging some way behind other sectors in taking positive action in improving their environmental performance.

Only 28% of respondents from manufacturing industry believed their companies are moving strongly or very strongly to adopting 'green' policies in their organisations.

This compares with 31% of businesses overall.

It is in particularly stark contrast to financial services companies, where 44% are actively seeking to reduce their 'carbon footprint'.

Sales director at Genesys Conferencing, Jerona Noonan, said: "However, looking ahead the growing impetus for change is common across all sectors.

Around one in five of all businesses surveyed already have dedicated 'green Czars' in place to spearhead future improvements in environmental performance".

* Cost efficiency - cost-efficiency remains the principal pressure overall in adopting green policies, cited by 24% of respondents, followed by regulation (23%).

Yet for manufacturing companies in particular, compliance is by some margin the strongest driver, cited by 31% of correspondents, compared to retail, distribution and transport (16%) and financial services (21%).

"This shows that, though manufacturing is no more regulated than, say financial services for example is at least as regulated as manufacturing, compliance tends to focus more on environmental performance than, say, fiscal transparency," said Noonan.

* Profitability - in assessing the impact of 'green' policies on firms' profitability, manufacturing companies are the most positive in recognising the ability of carbon-cutting initiatives to generate cost savings (confirmed by 46% of respondents), with only 21% anticipating costs to increase.

In retail, distribution and transport, by contrast, only 24% expect equivalent cost benefits, with 44% anticipating higher costs.

* Cut travel, cut costs, cut emissions - at this relatively early stage, priorities for driving 'green' initiatives tend to be tangible and well-established, such as recycling/waste policies (34% overall) and utilities (20%).

Travel is a relatively low priority for manufacturing, at just 8%.

"Yet here too, tools are available to impact significantly on manufacturing companies' green performance," said Noonan.

"In the key area of corporate travel budgets in particular, modern multimedia conferencing solutions can both significantly cut costs and reduce carbon emissions".

He added: "Equally importantly, such savings can be accurately measured through the use of Genesys Conferencing's own carbon calculator, for example, so encouraging full deployment and use of such tools across the business".

* About Genesys Conferencing - founded in 1986, Genesys Conferencing is a leading provider of unified collaboration and communication services to thousands of organisations worldwide, including more than half of the Fortune Global 500.

The company's flagship product, Genesys Meeting Center, provides an integrated multimedia collaboration solution that is easy to use and available on demand.

With offices in more than 20 countries across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific, the company offers an unmatched global presence and strong local support.

Genesys Conferencing is publicly traded on Euronext Eurolist C in France (FR0004270270).

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